culture incorporated

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 Mark W. Rectanus

culture incorporated
Museums, Artists, and Corporate Sponsorships

University of Minnesota Press

Minneapolis / London
Portions of chapters 3 and 4 originally appeared in “Kulturförderung und Kultursponsoring:
Positionen zwischen Kulturpolitik und Marktwirtschaft,” Internationales Archiv für Sozialgeschichte
der deutschen Literatur (IASL) 19, no. 1 (1994): 75–94; reprinted with permission of Max Niemeyer
Verlag, Tübingen. An earlier version of chapter 6 appeared as “New York—Bilbao—Berlin and
Back: The Global Museum and Cultural Politics,” European Studies Journal 17, no. 1 (2000):
41–66; reprinted with permission.

Copyright 2002 by the Regents of the University of Minnesota

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system,
or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording,
or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Published by the University of Minnesota Press

111 Third Avenue South, Suite 290
Minneapolis, MN 55401-2520
http://www.upress.umn.edu

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Rectanus, Mark W.
Culture incorporated : museums, artists, and corporate sponsorships / Mark W. Rectanus.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-8166-3851-9 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 0-8166-3852-7 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Art patronage. 2. Corporate sponsorship. 3. Museums—Economic aspects. 4. Arts—
Economic aspects. I. Title.
NX710 .R43 2002
700'.79—dc21
2001007088

Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper

The University of Minnesota is an equal-opportunity educator and employer.

12 11 10 09 08 07 06 05 04 03 02 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
 Contents

Acknowledgments vii
Abbreviations ix

Part I. Corporations and Culture: The New Partnership

1. Full Disclosure 3
2. Corporate Cultural Politics: Corporate Identity and Culture 22

Part II. Culture, Artists, Events

3. Redefining Culture, Absolutly 61
4. Sponsoring Lifestyle: Travels with Annie Leibovitz 99
5. Sponsoring Events: Culture as Corporate Stage, from Woodstock to
Ravestock and Reichstock 132

Part III. Museums, Cyberspace, Audiences

6. The Sponsored Museum; or, The Museum as Sponsor 171
7. Cybersponsoring 213

Notes 243
Bibliography 267
Index 279
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 Acknowledgments

I am grateful to a number of colleagues and institutions for their support throughout

this project. In particular, I would like to thank Georg Jäger at the Institut für
Deutsche Philologie, Ludwig-Maximilians Universität München, for his invitation to
conduct research in Munich under the auspices of an Alexander von Humboldt
Foundation Research Fellowship. His enthusiasm for the project, his insights during
the early stages of its development, and the opportunity to share it with his students
are greatly appreciated.
I would also like to specifically thank the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation
for its funding of this project and its ongoing support, which made my extensive re-
search in Germany possible. I am grateful to the foundation’s outstanding staff for
providing assistance during the grant, as well as for their ongoing commitment to new
areas of research. My research in the United States and Europe was also funded by
Iowa State University. Both a Faculty Improvement Leave and financial support from
the Council on Scholarship in the Humanities at Iowa State University allowed me to
expand the scope of this project and to present my research-in-progress at numerous
conferences. In Berlin, the Institut für Museumskunde provided generous access to
their archival materials and publications.
For their reading, comments, and suggestions on various aspects of the manu-
script, I am indebted to numerous colleagues. I would particularly like to thank Gerd
Gemünden, Georg Jäger, Alice Kuzniar, Burkard Hornung, and Michelle Mattson. I
am grateful to Elizabeth Rectanus for her unwavering support of the project and for
drawing my attention to the works of Annie Leibovitz. Neelum Chaudhry’s percep-
tive comments on the project were of considerable help in steering the manuscript to
publication. I would also like to thank Hans Haacke for his permission to use photo-
graphs of his installations, for his stimulating work (both print and visual) on corpo-
rate sponsorship, and for his interest in the book. David Yust kindly provided photo-
graphs of Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s Wrapped Reichstag.
Finally, at the University of Minnesota Press, I would like to thank my editor
Jennifer Moore for her commitment to the book project and Robin A. Moir for her
able assistance with the manuscript preparation.

vii
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 Abbreviations

aec Ars Electronic Center

ag Aktiengesellschaft (joint stock company)
amico Art Museum Image Consortium
ard a German public television station
arpanet Advanced Research Projects Agency Network
atm asynchronous transfer mode (a dedicated-connection switching
technology)
bam Brooklyn Academy of Music
bca Business Committee for the Arts
bse bovine spongiform encephalopathy
cave Cave Automatic Virtual Environment
cd-i compact-disc interactive
cdu Christlich Demokratische Union (Christian Democratic Union,
a political party)
cmc computer-mediated communications
csu Christlich Soziale Union (Christian Social Union, a political
party)
dasa DaimlerChrysler Aerospace
dgb Deutsche Guggenheim Berlin
eat Experiments in Art in Technology
esb Europäische Sponsoring Börse
eta Euskadi ta Askatasuna/Freedom to the Basques
eu European Union
frg Federal Republic of Germany
gdr German Democratic Republic

ix
x Abbreviations

gmb Guggenheim Museum Bilbao

kmw Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg
kpmg an accounting and consulting company
laa local arts agencies
mam Milwaukee Art Museum
mbb Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm
mesl Museum Educational Site Licensing Project
mip Museum Informatics Project
moo multi-user object-oriented programming
msm Munich City Museum
mtu Motorinen- und Turbinen Union
mtv a German television station
mud mixed-use development
muko Mukoviszidose-Hilfe
nafta North American Free Trade Agreement
nea National Endowment for the Arts
neh National Endowment for the Humanities
nlc National Labor Committee
orf Austria’s public television station
rtl a German television station
sin Sarajevo Is Next
smf Sarajevo Music Forum
spd Sozial Demokratische Partei Deutschlands (Social Democratic
Party)
srgf Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation
tbwa an advertising agency
trs Travel Related Services (American Express)
v&s V & S Vin & Sprit (a Swedish distiller)
vdm Vitra Design Museum
vvd Volkswagen-Versicherungsdienst GmbH
vw Volkswagen
wto World Trade Organization
ybas young British artists
zdf a German public television station
zkm Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie
 Part I

Corporations and Culture: The New Partnership

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 1. Full Disclosure

It takes art to make a company great.

There’s an art to helping those in need.
—Philip Morris Companies Inc.

“Imagine using the power of the arts to help feed the hungry.” This is the “modest
proposal” made by Philip Morris in its campaign “Arts against Hunger: A Global
Initiative . . . ,” which offered discounted tickets to arts events in return for donations
to food drives. This “global initiative” was undoubtedly only one component of yet
another public-relations strategy designed to repair the corporation’s image after suc-
cessive losses in tobacco litigation during the late 1990s.1 More important, however,
the advertisement focuses our attention on three key dimensions of corporate cultural
politics: corporate sponsorship of cultural programs; social sponsorships and “corpo-
rate philanthropy”; and the globalization of corporate cultural politics as practiced by
multinational and transnational corporations.
As the advertisement suggests, sponsorships are now embedded in many facets of
contemporary culture: cultural programs (from historic restorations to rock concerts),
social sponsorships (of education, health, and environmental programs), or sports
sponsorships. The borders between the social, cultural, and political, which sponsor-
ing ostensibly maintains, dissolve in the practice of corporate cultural politics. This is
underscored by the shift from separate programming for cultural and social sponsor-
ships to new programs that integrate cultural and social projects, both locally, in the
communities where corporations maintain their operations, and globally, in their pro-
motion of products and images. Corporate cultural politics attempt to legitimize cor-
porate interests in globalized societies—in cultural, social, economic, and political
spheres—but in doing so they also expose their stake in institutional and communal
discourses and values.
Not only has the corporation become accepted as a legitimate, institutionalized
participant in the cultural marketplace, but corporate cultural politics also define and
shape culture. Associating cultural sponsorship exclusively with “high culture” or

3
 Full Disclosure 5

patronage masks the corporation’s participation in constructing social relations and

identities in a multidimensional culture of everyday life, a culture that cannot be ade-
quately characterized as high or low. Culture Incorporated argues that an analysis of
sponsorship, as a function of corporate cultural politics, is now more crucial than
ever, precisely because sponsoring has become so ubiquitous. Sponsorships deflect at-
tention away from the corporation’s own functions as a cultural producer, promoter,
or mediator by projecting the image of an institutional entity standing outside the
cultural marketplace. Corporate cultural politics not only attempt to maintain social
legitimation, but they also respond to dynamic social forces and public policies (e.g.,
alcohol and tobacco legislation, environmental issues) that the corporation can par-
tially defuse or strategically redirect but not completely control. Culture cannot be
isolated from social and political agendas. Indeed, with respect to public policy, cul-
ture’s legitimacy is increasingly defined in terms of its social utility. Here, American
Canvas, a report by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), recommended that
arts programming be included in grants for federal funding for social services in order
to position local arts projects more favorably in the increasing competition for public
resources (Larson 1997, 128–29).
Postunification Germany provides a trenchant example of the intersection of pub-
lic and corporate cultural politics, particularly when they are considered in the con-
text of parliamentary debates on moving the capital from Bonn to Berlin, on Christo
and Jeanne-Claude’s Wrapped Reichstag project, or on the Holocaust Memorial.2 Al-
though some European Union (EU) nations, such as the United Kingdom, have inte-
grated sponsorships into cultural policy for many decades, Germany reflects signifi-
cant new trends among many EU countries, which are embracing combinations of
public, corporate, and foundation funding schemes, challenging the “commonly as-
sumed dichotomy between the market and the welfare state” in countries such as the
Netherlands (Hitters 1996, 257). While we must be aware of significant differences
among EU nations and the United States, recent developments in cultural politics
(even in the Netherlands, with its tradition of state funding) are strikingly similar
across nations. In Germany, the unification process accelerated the pace of corporate
sponsorships, which had become more widespread in the 1980s, and provided an op-
portunity for corporations to legitimize their status as “partners” in cultural program-
ming. The German context illustrates how the dual forces of privatization and global-
ization are reshaping the cultural terrain and how they have become crucial factors in
actually redefining the objectives of cultural politics. A prime example of privatiza-
tion, or corporatization, in the public discourse on cultural politics and globalization
during the 1990s was former Foreign Minister Klaus Kinkel’s redefinition of Germany’s
image abroad as “Corporate Germany” (Unternehmen Deutschland) (Kinkel 1996, 10).
Culture Incorporated traces the relations among corporations, artists, nonprofit cul-
tural institutions, foundations, governments, and audiences in interdisciplinary and

Figure 1.1. Corporations increasingly merge cultural and social sponsorships.

6 Full Disclosure

contextual approaches. While this investigation is informed by a significant body of

research in cultural studies, it goes beyond discrete analyses of advertising, promotion,
or institutional perspectives by exploring links to the cultural politics of sociocultural
programming. In addition, this book addresses positions of artists and their audi-
ences, through case studies of artists working in collaboration with sponsors (e.g.,
Annie Leibovitz and American Express), working in opposition to them (e.g., Hans
Haacke; Christo and Jeanne-Claude), or negotiating new positions between collabo-
ration and resistance (Michael Clegg and Martin Guttmann). By examining the inter-
relationships between the sponsor and sponsored culture, Culture Incorporated invites
readers to interrogate the interests of the corporation itself, rather than just the culture
it sponsors, and to consider the potential for alternative forms of participation in the
production of culture.

Overview
In Part I, I argue that global corporations (e.g. AT&T, BMW, DaimlerChrysler, IBM,
Philip Morris) have institutionalized their own cultural politics, which play a pivotal
role in the nexus of corporate, nonprofit, foundation, and national or regional poli-
tics. The first chapter situates corporate sponsorship in Germany and the United
States within the broader contours and discourses on cultural politics and globaliza-
tion. Chapter 2 traces the historical shift from corporate philanthropy and patronage
(prior to the 1960s) to contractual sponsorships, which now account for a significant
proportion of all corporate cultural programming. Corporate funding for culture ad-
vanced from its rather marginal role in the 1950s (in the United States) as a public
relations instrument and a source for product design and packaging to its institution-
alized status as a legitimate “player” in cultural policy and urban development. Si-
multaneously, corporate cultural politics emerged in response to dynamic social
forces over which it can exert only partial, albeit significant, control. Chapter 2 also
examines how corporate architecture and property development influence social poli-
cy and public space and how corporate identity is linked to artistic creativity and tech-
nology in defining the global, transnational corporation. Finally, I also investigate
how artist Hans Haacke’s installations deconstruct the interests embedded in corpo-
rate cultural politics by revealing the links between urban sites (e.g., Berlin), national
identity, and corporations.
Part II explores sponsorships as they relate to changing definitions of culture as
lifestyle and event. These studies interrogate the relations among corporate sponsors,
cultural institutions, artists, and audiences. In Chapter 3, I discuss the ways that cor-
porate cultural programming reflects the corporation’s emergence as a cultural pro-
ducer and mediator in its own right. Of course, corporations have a long history as
producers of mass consumer culture, but sponsorships of high culture also allowed
them to operate on both sides of the cultural boundary, which has been increasingly
blurred by the actual uses of everyday culture since the late 1960s. Artists, such as
Andy Warhol, also intentionally problematized these borders. For example, Absolut
Vodka’s “arts patronage” seizes upon postmodern culture’s fusion of high and low, as
 Full Disclosure 7

well as the importance of cultural identities, for its promotions. The repositioning of
the corporation as a “partner” with museums, symphonies, and public entities is also a
result of the emergence of what Andrew Wernick has called “promotional culture,”
which is a predominant, legitimized mode of communication within most aspects
of society (politics, education, media) and “virtually co-extensive with our produced
symbolic world” (Wernick 1991, 182). Wernick’s analysis provides a useful point of de-
parture for my investigation of the shifting signification between products and their
(commodified) images. Promotional culture based on image also sets the stage for cor-
porate “image transfer,” which links the positive image values of the cultural institu-
tion with the corporation. Finally, multicultural programming (AT&T, Kodak, Philip
Morris) attempts to fuse notions of ethnicity, cultural, and national identity with
community partnerships by integrating both social and cultural sponsorships.
In chapter 4, I present a detailed study of Annie Leibovitz’s collaboration with
American Express, one that illustrates the interdependence of corporate sponsors, the
media, advertising, museums, and artists. Leibovitz’s aesthetic and professional prac-
tices problematize the uses of photography within postmodern media culture. For
American Express, the advertising campaign and exhibit provided the opportunity to
coordinate the image of their product (the American Express Card and Travel Related
Services), the lifestyle orientations of their existing and potential markets, and subse-
quently the image of the sponsored exhibit. The mediation and representation of
these images is discussed within the specific context of postunification Germany
through an analysis of the media reception of the Photographs exhibit in Munich and
Leibovitz’s photographs of German celebrities (Michael Stich, Wim Wenders, Hanna
Schygulla). Travel and mobility (as a function of corporate globalization) become a
compensation for the loss of home and a stable locus of identity. The mediation of
place and identity (e.g., in Sarajevo, the Gulf War, and Las Vegas) form the thematic
focus of much of Leibovitz’s work during the 1990s and reveals the tensions in her aes-
thetic practices.
As examples of nonsponsored culture, Woodstock and Wrapped Reichstag, Berlin,
1971– 95 (Christo and Jeanne-Claude) became lightening rods for debates over politics
and culture. Chapter 5 explores the extent to which the proliferation of event culture
(from the Bregenz Festival to rock concerts for charity), upon which much of corpo-
rate sponsorship is based, operates within the dimensions of attraction and entertain-
ment, on the one hand, and critical reflection or subversion, on the other. Events play
a central role in the construction of individual and collective experience, signifying a
shift from sociological orientations based primarily on an economic semantic (the dif-
ferentiation between “more” and “less”) to a psychophysical semantic of structuring
lived experiences—what sociologist Gerhard Schulze calls “die Erlebnisgesellschaft.”
Simultaneously, economic rationales have become a central orientation for legitimiz-
ing cultural politics in Germany. Schulze’s extensive analysis of contemporary society
provides important insights into the composition of audiences and social milieus par-
ticipating in event and lifestyle culture. This dimension is related to John Urry’s no-
tion of postmodern practices of (cultural) tourism, which he calls “consuming places.”
8 Full Disclosure

In chapter 5, I also discuss sponsors’ attempts to colonize such youth-subcultural

scenes as charitable concerts and festivals. Finally, I investigate Christo’s Wrapped
Reichstag project as a challenge to institutionally sponsored events, notions of public
and private spaces, and cultural politics in postunification Germany.
Part III focuses on the redefinition of the museum as a privileged and contested
site of cultural mediation and reception. Chapter 6 traces the convergence of the in-
stitutional interests of corporations, governments, nonprofit cultural institutions, and
foundations through an examination of the museum. A significant feature of the mu-
seum is its transformation into a multiple-use cultural center (for entertainment, con-
sumption, education, information, representation). I investigate the globalization of
the Guggenheim Museum (through satellites in New York; Bilbao, Spain; and Berlin)
with respect to its use of corporate globalization strategies—specifically, its politics of
space (Frank Gehry’s architecture), image politics (collaborations with sponsor Hugo
Boss), and its role in local cultural politics. The Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg illustrates
the fusion of economic, political, and corporate (Volkswagen) interests in construct-
ing regional cultural politics and the importance of private funding for German mu-
seums. Corporate museums (the BMW Museum and the Vitra Design Museum) cre-
ate narratives and spaces for corporate history and for histories of technology and
culture.
Chapter 7, “Cybersponsoring,” continues our investigation of the museum by ex-
ploring the emergence of meta-museums, virtual museums, and corporate cultural
politics in cyberspace. The Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie (ZKM), in
Karlsruhe, Germany, and the Ars Electronica Center (AEC), in Linz, Austria, gained
international attention by fusing art and technology and by developing multiple, hy-
brid museum spaces under one conceptual and administrative structure. Simulta-
neously, well-established museums are digitizing their collections, acquiring media
art, and establishing new projects such as the Guggenheim Virtual Museum. Both
meta- and virtual museums reflect a fundamental reconfiguration of the way muse-
ums’ contents are mediated to publics and a heightened awareness of technology as a
medium of artistic expression. I conclude chapter 7 by summarizing some of the key
developments in corporate cultural politics, assessing their significance for public cul-
tural politics, and considering the potential for audiences to assume a greater role in
democratizing cultural institutions.

Cultural Politics: Investing in Social Capital

At the outset of the twenty-first century, Berlin is an ideal place to observe the forces
of corporate globalization, corporate politics of space, and debates over national iden-
tity or postnational identity. Corporate representation is made literally concrete in the
expansive building projects by Daimler (DaimlerChrysler) at Potsdamer Platz or in
the Sony Center, reflecting the material interests of corporate real estate development.
Beyond deploying their corporate images within the urban center, these projects es-
tablish the corporation’s political, economic, and social interests in “real” spaces, in
 Full Disclosure 9

Germany’s new capital and in the center of the “new Europe’s” crossroads between
east and west.
With respect to corporate cultural politics in Germany and the United States, I
will focus on many of their similarities and institutional convergences rather than de-
lineating their differences. Of course, there are significant historical, structural, politi-
cal, and sociocultural differences between the two nations (Heinrichs 1997, 132–59).
Cultural institutions in Germany (museums, theaters, operas, symphonies) are pri-
marily financed by local municipalities and state governments (Länder), and there is
still widespread support for the public financing of culture. However, the shift to mul-
tiple, or “mixed,” forms of cultural financing, which rely on fund-raising, endow-
ments, merchandising, and sponsorships, was and is being driven by the economic
exigencies of postunification budget cuts within local governments, by European inte-
gration, and by globalization within the cultural sector (e.g., media conglomerates
such as Bertelsmann or Disney). In some respects, it was inevitable that corporate
globalization would also affect public cultural politics, as national economies are in-
creasingly integrated into global networks of communication. In the German case,
unification accelerated this development, which, as Werner Heinrichs points out, can-
not be reversed: “Even if ‘German Unification’ is at some point financed and un-
employment returns to ‘normalcy,’ everything will not be able to be just as it was in
the 1970s and 1980s” (1997, v). Sociodemographic and structural factors are also con-
tributing to this shift in public funding; such factors include a proportionally older
German population, an increasing number of single households, and globalization
trends that place greater pressure on the German economy to maintain (high-paying)
jobs and competitive products (Heinrichs 1997, v). Heinrichs’s main thesis is that the
economics of funding culture are in large part driving the redefinition of cultural poli-
tics; that is, the shortage of funding will contribute to a discussion of what is funded,
how it is funded, and how the projects are organized or structured (vi). Despite the
differences between Germany and the United States (as well as other European na-
tions), he suggests that Germany should look to the United Kingdom, the United
States, Sweden, and France in developing a new system that will shift to multiple
funding sources (public, foundation, corporate, endowment).
The studies in this book indicate that the shift to mixed funding in Germany,
which began in the early 1990s, is already well under way.3 Certainly, proposed changes
in the German tax laws, changes that would encourage more charitable donations,
will provide further impetus for endowments, which so many U.S. cultural institu-
tions now rely upon. Moreover, in both nations, massive capital resources will be
transferred to the baby-boom generation in the form of inheritance during the first
two decades of the twenty-first century.
Yet it remains to be seen how this capital will be directed and what the impact
will be for cultural institutions. If past experience in the EU and the United States is
any indicator, there will be a tendency to develop new, high-profile projects. Although
this may present the potential for innovative approaches and projects outside the
10 Full Disclosure

established institutional boundaries, existing foundations will remain major players in

the cultural landscape. Indeed, the stock market boom of the 1990s provided signifi-
cant capital appreciation to well-established nonprofits, such as the Ford Foun-
dation,4 but new foundations have also emerged from the high-tech sector.5 In
Germany, existing cultural institutions will be increasingly dependent upon their own
fund-raising for establishing endowments, as well as upon new forms of promotion
and merchandising, with the consequences that they will also be competing with
other sites of (urban) entertainment and event culture. Although foundations, en-
dowments, and public funding may support ongoing overhead costs, sponsorships
will in all likelihood continue to perform an important function in funding a substan-
tial percentage of new exhibitions or high-profile events, which could not occur with-
out the sponsorships. Indeed, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation report on its
new museum in Bilbao stated that sponsors now fund as much as 70 percent of exhi-
bition costs in the United States and Europe: “The benefit to corporations for spon-
soring these exhibitions will be tailored to their marketing objectives as well as their
client and employee needs. Support of this kind is often achieved through board-
member connections or contacts within the corporation” (Museo Guggenheim Bilbao
1997, chapter 6, page 3).
A recurring theme of this book is that sponsorships have considerable qualitative
impact in cultural politics, even when they represent a relatively small proportion
of programming budgets. Corporate expenditures for culture are frequently under-
estimated. This is in part due to the fact that they are included within corporate mar-
keting and promotion budgets rather than within corporate philanthropy, which is
being replaced by sponsorships (Schreiber 1994, 18). The key issue here is that corpo-
rations have a disproportionate influence in shaping cultural programming. If many
museums are dependent upon some form of sponsorship for even a third of their
funding for exhibitions, then it is a source they can scarcely forgo. As we will see, cul-
tural institutions, not just sponsors, profit from higher levels of visibility for the spon-
sored project, despite the fact that corporate funding is only one of multiple funding
sources. The advantage of “corporate partners” is that they are already “wired in” to
the promotional media and can mobilize their own (global) communication chan-
nels. In fact, a positive “image transfer” is precisely the point of the sponsorship, for
the corporation and for the cultural institution (Bruhn 1991, 224–32).
In the United States, corporate expenditures for cultural programming make up a
higher proportion of all funding for culture than in Germany, and are firmly institu-
tionalized within the cultural marketplace. The magnitude of this support is illustrat-
ed rather dramatically by Intel Corporation’s sponsorship of The American Century:
Art and Culture at the Whitney Museum of American Art in 1998. The Whitney and
Intel announced that the sponsorship was the largest ever funded for an art-museum
exhibition—$6 million.6 By comparison, actual funding for NEA grants in 2000 was
only about $80 million.7 After the “culture wars” of the 1980s and 1990s, resulting in
budget cuts and threats to eliminate the NEA altogether, the NEA proposed a new di-
 Full Disclosure 11

rection for funding in its report American Canvas, which would offer a new legitimacy
to public culture by linking it with social programs. The report called for an increased
role for the arts within everyday life in local communities, that is, collaborations be-
tween local arts associations (LAAs) and community organizations ranging from
school districts to housing or social services agencies to law enforcement agencies
(Larson 1997, 82–86). As I observed at the outset, this fusion of cultural and social
programming, reflected in corporate programs such as Philip Morris’s “Arts against
Hunger” campaign, is in keeping with corporate initiatives to validate and insert their
interests into local communities.
In a somewhat similar vein, Stefan Toepler has suggested using Lester Salamon’s
notion of “social capital” in order to reposition the debate on arts funding:
The arts should look to the debate on civil society and social capital, defined as “the
bonds of trust and norms of reciprocity that individuals develop by interacting with
one another.” “Looking at the arts from a social capital angle would entail a greater
focus on those parts of the cultural universe that actually provide venues for citizens to
participate and interact, which in turn fosters social bonds and raises the level of trust
in communities.” (Toepler, 1999, 2, quoting Salamon)

Toepler envisions the artist “as community convener or even as community mediator.
The most fruitful area to explore is how the arts can contribute to building social
capital and how arts organizations can become more effective players in a reinvigorat-
ed civil society” (2). Although I think the role of the artist and audiences in the com-
munity is a pivotal one—indeed, I argue that artists and audiences must play a vital
role in (re)asserting their own diverse interests—I also believe that the participants (or
so-called stakeholders) in the networks of cultural production, mediation, and recep-
tion are not positioned equally with respect to their economic, political, or cultural
status. Moreover, I believe we should differentiate among forms of cultural produc-
tion. That is, communities must also be willing to receive forms of culture that chal-
lenge social norms and values (see chapter 5). Historically, it has always been easier to
make a case for funding the canon of “high culture” rather than the avant-garde or
even popular culture.
The notion of social capital seems to imply that art, in order to be institutionally le-
gitimized, must be reduced to its social instrumentality. Toepler’s argument suggests
that the existing paradigms that defend cultural funding on the grounds that they fos-
ter economic development (e.g., through product merchandising or urban marketing)
be replaced (or substantially shifted) to a new social instrumentality (social develop-
ment) (1999, 1). Of course, the notion of social capital is an attempt to pragmatically
reposition nonprofits within a highly competitive marketplace of discourses vying for
legitimacy and economic capital. However, is it not true that those nonprofits that are
well positioned in terms of economic capital can purchase social or cultural capital?
And is this not what sponsors actually do?
On the one hand, sponsorship practices indicate that the shift to legitimizing
12 Full Disclosure

culture on the basis of social capital has already occurred, but without the equal partner-
ship within the system envisioned by Salamon and Toepler. On the other hand, the
cultural institutions that have been the most successful in terms of their public visi-
bility, market success, and media reception (such as the Guggenheim) have accom-
plished this from a basis of economic capital (foundation investments) and cultural
capital (i.e., collection development and diversification; collaborations with sponsors
such as Hugo Boss or Giorgio Armani; heightened institutional image) rather than by
attempting to validate their legitimacy through social capital (other than museum
pedagogy and outreach).8 Thus, economic capital and cultural capital cannot be
deleted from the social-capital equation.9 Though the notion of social capital is in
part based on the idea that it will be “shared” (through partnerships), there is little
consensus on how the economic capital or cultural capital, which can build social
capital, will be shared. More simply, not all of the partners come to the table with
equal amounts of “capital” (social, economic, or cultural), nor do they necessarily
have the same interests or objectives.10 The point is not that culture should be di-
vorced from the social context—on the contrary. Social capital obscures culture’s inex-
tricable links to all aspects of society, particularly the economic and the political, and
functions as yet another public policy vehicle that can deflect attention from the eco-
nomic and institutional interests of the participants.

Full Disclosure
The inextricable links among social, cultural, and economic capital were manifest in
the recurring crises in cultural institutions during the 1980s and 1990s (e.g., the “cul-
ture wars” over funding for the NEA and exhibition policies). Such crises revealed the
dissonances embedded in contemporary cultural politics while simultaneously pro-
viding an opportunity to interrogate these interests. The Sensation exhibition at the
Brooklyn Museum of Art in 1999, featuring the works of young British artists (YBAs)
from the Saatchi Collection, became a paradigmatic case of institutional and political
self-interest. Ultimately, the media coverage of the exhibition focused on two issues:11
(1) the legal actions initiated by New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani to revoke
funding for the museum in reaction to some of the works (i.e., Chris Ofili’s The Holy
Virgin Mary) and as a result of the city’s specious claim that the museum had violated
its lease; (2) the museum’s solicitation of funding for Sensation from sources that
could profit financially from the media exposure provided for the artists (i.e., from the
Saatchi Collection and auction houses, such as Christie’s, representing the artists), as
well as conflict-of-interest issues relating to David Bowie’s use of the Sensation exhibit
on his Web site (at no cost to his Internet company) and a subsequent contribution to
the museum.
Although Giuliani’s efforts to revoke the museum’s funding were rejected on First
Amendment grounds, the case did generate media exposure for his political image
(positive or negative). In doing so, the Sensation suit also reinforced boundaries that
publicly funded cultural institutions carefully observe in order to maintain political
 Full Disclosure 13

support for funding. For many museums, the sensation over Sensation could cut both
ways. Although it had provided increased publicity for the Brooklyn Museum of Art
and the exhibition, it also generated substantial negative publicity both in the repre-
sentation of the exhibition itself and, perhaps more importantly, with respect to the
ethics of its funding practices.12 For publicly funded cultural institutions, the implicit
threat of reduced funding and negative media coverage may lead to self-censorship.
This was apparently the case when the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, can-
celed Sensation after the controversy in New York City. The museum’s director, Brian
Kennedy, not only commented that the funding practices of the Brooklyn Museum
cast a negative light on the exhibition but also referred to public criticism regarding
the exhibition itself: “We cannot ignore what’s happened in Brooklyn; we’re not dis-
connected from the art world. We’re not separate.”13 The direct impact of the Brook-
lyn Museum case in Australia reflects not only the globalization of the exhibition mar-
ket itself but, more notably, the concrete effects on local cultural politics and museum
practices resulting from global media coverage. Unlike the Australian case, in which
the exhibition was canceled as a result of controversy in Brooklyn, the success of Sen-
sation in London and Berlin had been an inducement for the Brooklyn Museum to
promote it as a major exhibition. In Germany, the growing influence of collectors
(such as Saatchi) in the international art market, as well as museums’ willingness to
accommodate them, was indeed an issue when Berlin’s Sensation appeared at the
Hamburger Bahnhof, in Berlin, although the Berlin exhibition was financed by
a nonprofit organization, Friends of the National Gallery (Verein der Freunde der
Nationalgalerie), for 1.7 million deutsche marks. Despite the nonprofit funding of
Sensation, the exhibition was considered by some to be a sign of increasing dependency
on commercial interests, with its consequent potential negative impact in Germany,
where museums have increasingly embraced sponsorships since the late 1980s.14
Sensation had again raised issues of the ethical boundaries among exhibition fund-
ing, collectors, and corporate sponsors. What was at issue here was an indictment not
of sponsorships per se, for they have become an integral part of museum practice, but
rather of the failure to recognize and disclose these interests. This was a recurring
theme in both U.S. and international press coverage. In the New York Times, David
Barstow observes varying and eroding standards for museum ethics, referring to com-
ments by specialists on museum ethics “that potential conflicts of interest are best
handled when they are fully disclosed to the public.”15 Yet in an interview with
Germany’s Süddeutsche Zeitung, a Brooklyn Museum spokesperson asserted that be-
cause there are no clear guidelines regulating the relations between museums and
sponsors, similar practices are common at other institutions; however, their potential
conflicts of interest are not open to disclosure (as the court documents were in the
Brooklyn case).16
From another perspective, full disclosure, when it actually occurs, reveals the sys-
temic interdependencies of the participants within the complex networks of cultural
production, mediation, and reception. Full disclosure of financial and contractual
14 Full Disclosure

agreements is therefore a first step toward ethical, open procedures. If disclosure does
not inherently alter the manner in which cultural mediation occurs, it can reframe the
contexts in which culture will be received by illuminating the financial and political
interests of those involved. In the case of Sensation, one form of disclosure, that is,
presentation in the cultural media, was able to focus attention on these systemic de-
pendencies and institutional interests. Thus, the microlevel of exhibition financing
and ethics are only symptomatic of wider institutional convergences, which this book
will explore.
In this instance, Sensation represented part of what Marion Leske referred to as the
“Saatchi System,” that is, a microsystem of art consumption, marketing, exhibition,
and speculation—both responding to and shaping forces in the macromarkets of
global culture and media. Saatchi’s system operated by (1) financing and sponsoring
alternative art schools (e.g., YBAs at London’s Goldsmith’s College); (2) acquiring art-
works from promising young artists based on the contacts with these schools; (3) pro-
moting and publicizing the artists and their works at Saatchi’s own galleries; (4) pro-
moting and loaning the Saatchi collection for international exhibitions, thereby
increasing the value of many works; and (5) selling some of the works at auction and
donating the proceeds to art schools.17
Part of the new mix of cultural funding both in the United States and the EU po-
sitions nonprofit foundations as major players in the cultural landscape. Yet few non-
profit foundations or museum foundations (including those receiving significant pub-
lic funding, as in the Brooklyn Museum case) practice full disclosure of their funding
data and sponsorship contracts. In Germany, for example, fewer than 10 percent of
the major foundations publish more than superficial reports on their finances and in-
terests. Rupert Graf Strachwitz has pointed out that this lack of transparency regard-
ing funding interests ultimately undermines the legitimacy of cultural foundations.18
Corporate rhetoric promoting cultural programs as a “dialogue with audiences” may
lead to greater public skepticism and cynicism when funding schemes, such as those
revealed during the Sensation exhibition, expose the underlying self-interests of insti-
tutions, sponsors, and politicians.

Unfinished Business
Museum ethics and guidelines can only be seen as one component of a much broader
institutional analysis that incorporates the interests of artists and audiences rather than
relegating ethical guidelines to museums and sponsors alone. Precisely the areas of con-
temporary museum practice that are not as visible or overtly contested as were those in-
volved in Sensation reveal shifts in the terrain of cultural politics. Another highly pub-
licized, albeit significantly less controversial, case of conflict of interest between
exhibition policies and corporate interests, the Guggenheim Museum’s Giorgio
Armani retrospective (2000), represents a historical marker in the convergence between
museums’ and corporations’ interests and away from corporate interests overtly shap-
ing museum practices. Designer Giorgio Armani’s sponsorship agreement with the
 Full Disclosure 15

Guggenheim (the museum had similar agreements with Hugo Boss), for a reported
$15 million, raised the question of whether the exhibition was a quid pro quo for the
sponsorship.19 (The show itself was sponsored by Time Warner’s In Style magazine.)
Neither the Guggenheim nor Armani would confirm the amount of the donation nor
the terms of the sponsorship agreement.
Thematic exhibitions on fashion and the museum as a stage for fashion events
have become relatively commonplace since the 1980s (e.g., Wolfgang Joop and the
Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, Hugo Boss and the Guggenheim). Moreover, museums
certainly have a role to play in examining fashion as a cultural artifact and as an inte-
gral part of everyday life and social history and in looking at its considerable influence
on shaping notions of identity and the body. Of course, a key issue is how such exhi-
bitions mediate diverse discourses on the functions of designs, not just those on con-
sumption and desire. This critical perspective was certainly lacking in Giorgio Armani,
an exhibition weighted heavily to Armani’s most recent designs, that is, those still
being sold or promoted.20 The Armani exhibition did not address these links to fash-
ion’s multiple narratives in any larger sense, nor did it develop a more sophisticated
representation of the impact of Armani’s oeuvre in broader aesthetic and cultural con-
texts. The role of the exhibition as a promotional vehicle is echoed in Roberta Smith’s
assessment of the Armani retrospective, which she also considers in the light of a gen-
eral devaluation of art itself within contemporary curatorial practices. Regarding the
social and institutional conflicts embedded in the museum’s role, Smith refers to
David Hickey’s notion that “the discourse of art is about conflict of interest,” com-
menting that “in museums, monetary and aesthetic interests‚ the power of money and
the value of art‚ are constantly and repeatedly pitted against each other.”21
The “discourse of art” as “conflict of interest” is also a discourse embedded within
the Guggenheim’s own institutional history and curatorial politics. Within the con-
text of the broader uses of full disclosure, these discourses reference real social and
economic interests that were as much a part of museum politics thirty years ago as
they are today (as illustrated in the Armani exhibition). Here, I am referring to the
Guggenheim’s cancellation of the exhibition Hans Haacke: Systems shortly before
its opening in April 1971 as well as of his subsequent work Solomon R. Guggenheim
Museum Board of Trustees (1974). The exhibition included a number of pieces, most
notably Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Real Estate Holdings, a Real-Time Social System, as
of May 1, 1971, that explored power and social relations between museums and corpo-
rate real estate development in New York City. With regard to Shapolsky, Rosalyn
Deutsche writes,
By expanding the work’s context beyond the museum walls to encompass the city
in which the museum is situated, Haacke did not merely extend the notion of site-
specificity geographically. Neither did he simplistically attempt to surmount institu-
tional boundaries by symbolically placing his artwork “outside” the museum and ad-
dressing “real” subject matter. Rather, he permitted the viewer to apprehend the
16 Full Disclosure

institutional apparatus by questioning the twin fetishisms of two, equally real, sites.
Both the city‚ constructed in mainstream architectural and urban discourses as a strict-
ly physical, utilitarian, or aesthetic space‚ and the museum‚ conceived in idealist art
discourse as a pure aesthetic realm‚ appear as spatial forms marked by a political
economy. (1998, 171–72)

More explicit links between the Guggenheim family and their membership on
corporate boards, as well as corporate representation on the Guggenheim Museum’s
board, are documented in Haacke’s Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum Board of Trustees.
Yet these interlocking interests, which were certainly not unique to the Guggenheim,
were not considered relevant to the museum or to any notion of the institutional role
of museums. As Deutsche points out, the Guggenheim’s director, Thomas Messer, re-
asserted that the art museum was a sphere separate from the social and economic
forces of the city and society within which it existed (1998, 191), despite the obvious
contradictions in the documentation that Haacke’s work itself provided. Again, the
Guggenheim was certainly not unique in its insistence on separating institutional in-
terests from artistic ones. Indeed, the social, economic, and political links between the
cultural spaces of the museum and corporate interests are part of the (repressed) his-
torical narratives of museums in social space, which have only become part of more-
recent institutional memory. Some museums, such as Munich’s Haus der Kunst, the
site of the National Socialist Entartete Kunst exhibition (1937), have begun to integrate
their own past into the exhibition space of the museum itself (see chapter 6).
The ongoing interrogation of the interrelations and dependencies between public
space and corporate space, not only as a central issue of Haacke’s works but also as
a form of intervention in social spaces, is referenced in the title of his 1985 exhibition,
Hans Haacke: Unfinished Business, at the New Museum of Contemporary Art.22
Haacke’s works not only deconstruct the institutional links of power and the aesthet-
ics of their representation, but they also excavate their historical foundations. In this
sense, his works make a contribution to the process of social disclosure that has been
legally codified and defined as a process of bringing into view by uncovering, laying bare,
revealing to knowledge, freeing from secrecy or ignorance, and making known.23 They
accomplish this through an interrogation of the representational spaces of political
and corporate power within the real physical spaces of political power, for example,
real estate development by Daimler-Benz at Berlin’s Potsdamer Platz following Ger-
man reunification. Chapter 2 explores how corporate real estate development, as one
form of corporate cultural politics, frequently uses culture and artists as an invest-
ment, that is, a form of cultural capital, in order to increase property values and as a
promotional vehicle to maintain social legitimacy and to position corporate interests
within local communities. More recently, Haacke’s installation in the Reichstag, Der
Bevölkerung, references the building’s historical and ideological functions by altering
the original inscription, “To the German people” (“dem deutschen volke”), located
on the outside of the building, to one located within the walls of power of the
 Full Disclosure 17

Reichstag itself. Thus, Haacke’s work, which reads “To the Population” (“der be-
völkerung”), addresses the tension between the historical and spatial functions of
the Reichstag as a site of power and a symbol of a divided German identity while si-
multaneously addressing the manner in which it constructs power relations both ex-
ternally and internally.24
Thus, I would suggest that disclosure must be addressed in its multiple, interrelated
dimensions and discourses, as historical, legal, economic, political, spatial, and insti-
tutional questions as well as fundamentally cultural and social ones. The trajectory
from the Guggenheim’s ban on Haacke to the Giorgio Armani retrospective in some
sense reflects the Guggenheim Museum’s own reconfiguration into a global corporate
entity with numerous satellite subsidiaries. At the same time, corporations have as-
sumed institutional roles as cultural producers, not only as a result of the products
and images they disseminate globally but also by promoting themselves as “artist-
entrepreneurs” (e.g., Armani) and creating their own institutionalized forms of cul-
tural programming, which ranges from corporate museums to extensive cultural and
social programming orchestrated by cultural communications, marketing, and spon-
sorship departments. However, these interests are not only threatened by interven-
tions by artists and communities. A recurring theme of this book is that the expansion
of corporate cultural politics is not only in itself a response to the destabilization of
corporate legitimacy in public policy but also provides cultural infrastructure for cor-
porate products, services, and images.
Finally, history and memory are an integral part of the process of disclosure, of ex-
cavating the institutional narratives of the more recent and distant past. Despite work
by historians to provide further knowledge of this past, the significance of corporate
histories has only recently received more attention from the public. This is, in part, a
result of major lawsuits, consumer advocacy, and legal actions by state and federal rep-
resentatives, as well as the attendant media coverage. Although many corporations
claim that their past is general knowledge—a part of the historical record—they have
been unwilling to accept responsibility for their past actions or to discuss the unwrit-
ten past. This pertains not only to their products (e.g., tobacco) but also to the impli-
cation of corporate capital and interests in political power, as was the case under
National Socialism. At the end of the last decade of the twentieth century, more than
half a century after the Holocaust, the role of Swiss banks during National Socialism
was finally investigated, despite years of resistance from both the banks and the Swiss
government. In Germany, lawsuits filed in the United States against German corpora-
tions on behalf of victims of slave and forced labor in German industry during Na-
tional Socialism provided impetus for a fund (established by German corporations
and the German government) to compensate the victims (Stiftungsinitiative der
deutschen Wirtschaft). Even after the fund had been established, groups representing
the victims asserted that the fund administrators for German industry, by delaying
initial payments, were not acting in good faith—a view shared by members of the
German Parliament.25 The public’s perception that corporations are unwilling to
18 Full Disclosure

engage in a public discussion of their past is reinforced by the belated recognition of

responsibility in both of these major cases. Although this book does not address corpo-
rate histories, I argue that corporate museums—as part of corporate cultural politics—
may represent an attempt to rewrite social histories of technologies as well as institu-
tional histories. To the extent that corporate museums of art or technology have
established their legitimacy as sites of education and entertainment, they also should
be considered in terms of a broader process of rewriting our own collective histories.

Globalization
If, as Thomas L. Friedman argues, technology is one of the major forces driving glob-
alization (2000, 440), then corporations are strategically positioned to assert their in-
terests. Technology is indeed key to understanding the globalization of corporate cul-
tural programming. Technology not only becomes a vehicle for mediating culture
(e.g., in corporate museums or exhibitions such as the Guggenheim’s The Art of the
Motorcycle sponsored by BMW) (Hyde 1998, 95), but technology transfer from corpo-
rations to cultural institutions, or in reverse as “cultural software” transferred back to
the corporation, are also lauded as forms of creative synergy (see chapter 7). New
forms of cybersponsoring, such as Intel’s Web site for the Whitney’s American Century
exhibition, “allow teachers from Omaha to Helsinki to Tokyo to incorporate the exhi-
bition into the curriculum and take their students on virtual field trips” by utilizing
audio, video, and 3-D technologies for online viewing.26 Online rock concerts for
charitable causes (e.g., Cisco Systems’ sponsorship of Net Aid) also illustrate the de-
velopment of virtual space for corporate promotion and globalized cultural program-
ming that link both “real” and virtual spaces.
However, we should be cautious in considering globalization only in terms of cor-
porate hegemony or colonizing without simultaneously recognizing forces that con-
test corporate politics or force their realignment—a leitmotiv of this book. Moreover,
globalization involves a number of paradoxes that can only be theorized through a
certain degree of differentiation and, I would argue, through a combination of macro
and micro analyses. Malcolm Waters concludes that theories of globalization define
it as a process of simultaneous homogenization and differentiation (1996, 136, 139).
These forces emanate from relationships between social organization and territoriality
that are, in turn, characterized by three central functions of exchange: Material ex-
changes localize, political exchanges internationalize, and symbolic exchanges globalize
(8–9). Thus, corporations express their interests on multiple levels simultaneously. For
example, transnationals develop markets in eastern Europe through their new opera-
tions in Berlin, they utilize this urban space for real estate developments in the enter-
tainment and financial sectors (e.g., the DaimlerChrysler or Sony shopping complex-
es at Potsdamer Platz), they maintain close proximity to the seat of government in
order to further their political interests, and they promote their products and services
locally and globally. The fusion of corporate and cultural institutions such as the
Deutsche Guggenheim Berlin (i.e., the Deutsche Bank AG and the Solomon R.
Figure 1.2. Corporate history in the public forum: poster for a discussion in Frankfurt am Main.
20 Full Disclosure

Guggenheim Museum) represents global image promotion (of the bank and the mu-
seum) within the specific local site of Berlin and the bank building (see chapter 6).
Ulrich Beck views the EU as an opportunity for an equitable reregulation of social
policies (and an overhaul of the World Trade Organization) despite, or perhaps in re-
sponse to, the forces of privatization and global corporatization (1998, 263). Like
Joschka Fischer (foreign minister under Gerhard Schröder’s red-green coalition), Beck
believes that European integration provides a political opening for the reexamination
of social, political, and human rights policies (263). Certainly the introduction of
comprehensive, Europe-wide standards for the environment, wages, or social policies
would have a decided impact on forces of corporate globalization by simultaneously
setting benchmark standards for non-EU nations. I would also suggest that political
responses to corporate products, for example, opposition to genetically modified
organisms in processed foods (including objections based on food-safety issues result-
ing from the mad cow disease [bovine spongiform encephalopathy, BSE] crisis in
Europe), not only have a ripple effect within transnational corporations but also reso-
nate in public opinion in non-EU nations. Fischer’s attempt to reconcile notions of
national identity with a postnational federation (through an EU constitution) is based
on common standards of social equity for all “citizens,” but it also would allow for
national diversity.27 Here, the EU plays a significant role in dealing with the forces of
globalization, rather than abdicating this leadership to the United States, as Friedman
suggests.28
In her book No Logo, Naomi Klein addresses the expansion of global corporate in-
terests through the proliferation of corporate brands embedded in the social contexts
and spaces of contemporary society. Moreover, Klein points to the potential for social
conflict resulting from a growing consciousness of the consequences of global corpo-
rate policies creating “No Space,” “No Choice,” and “No Jobs” (emphasis in original)
but also leading to a rejection of the all-pervasive corporate brands themselves, which
would strike the core of corporate economic power:
By attempting to enclose our shared culture in sanitized and controlled brand cocoons,
these corporations have themselves created the surge of opposition. . . . By thirstily ab-
sorbing social critiques and political movements as sources of brand “meaning,” they
have radicalized that opposition still further. By abandoning their traditional role as di-
rect, secure employers to pursue their branding dreams, they have lost the loyalty that
once protected them from citizen rage. And by pounding the message of self-sufficiency
into a generation of workers, they have inadvertently empowered their critics to express
that rage without fear. (1999, 441–42)

Indeed, corporate proclamations of a new social partnership first articulated in the

late 1980s and made concrete through the rapid growth of sociocultural programming
in the 1990s, such as “Arts against Hunger,” could only be legitimized through in-
creasing interventions within the spaces of social and public policy that increasingly
challenge corporate values.
 Full Disclosure 21

Benjamin Barber sees the antidote to a corporate globalization of “McWorld” that

“has threatened the autonomy of civil society and its cultural and spiritual domains,
as well as of politics” in the form of “a many-sectored civil society in which the au-
tonomy of each distinctive domain . . . is guaranteed by the sovereignty of the demo-
cratic state”(1996, 296). For Barber, the integrity of democratic institutions stands at
the core of maintaining social equality with diversity (300).
With respect to the globalization of culture and society, it is therefore crucial that
we reexamine our cultural institutions and their increasing convergence with corpo-
rate cultural politics, not only with an eye to how corporations shape culture, that is,
their practices within and outside of the corporation, but also with respect to the way
they have created a new consensus in determining institutional objectives and how the
new partnership (Schreiber 1994) between corporations and communities should be
structured. This involves an investigation and recognition of the economic, cultural,
and social capital vested in our institutions. Beyond advertising and promotion, this
book explores how corporate cultural politics reframe and restructure institutional
discourses that facilitate the increasing convergence between cultural and social insti-
tutions, corporations, and nonprofit foundations. This convergence accelerates the
blurring of boundaries between public and commercial interests or public and com-
mercial space while deflecting attention away from a critical interrogation of corpora-
tions themselves. Although notions of “outside” and “within” may be useful in identi-
fying corporate strategies and examining potential forms of resistance, we must also
recognize the extent to which we are implicated individually, institutionally, or com-
munally in these processes. Rosalyn Deutsche has argued that the notion of a clear
differentiation of spatial boundaries and their representation (in this case, the bound-
aries between public and private, between corporate and cultural spaces) restricts a
fuller analysis of social space that would “deter us from investigating the real political
struggles inherent in the production of all spaces and from enlarging the field of
struggles to make many different kinds of spaces public” (1998, 374–75n121). I hope
this study will contribute to a fuller awareness of the nature of these institutional, cul-
tural, and communal relations as a part of larger movements that are also underway to
reexamine corporate politics both locally and globally.
 2. Corporate Cultural Politics:
Corporate Identity and Culture

On the day the Berlin Wall fell, we decided to send a film crew to the scene immediately. . . . Our
immediate concern was that something important was happening that would have a direct and
immediate impact on millions of lives, and that would directly influence millions of others around
the world in a positive way. We knew there would be value in that linkage for Pepsi. . . . We made
a commercial that celebrated the moment and closed with the words “Peace on Earth,” joined
tastefully to a small Pepsi-Cola logo. A big event, and Pepsi was proud to be a small part of it.
—Alan Pottasch, in Lifestyle and Event Marketing

During the 1990s, mapping the terrain of cultural politics in the United States and
Germany was not only a matter of registering the ongoing financial and identity crises
(while developing survival strategies) but also a process of renegotiating the institu-
tional roles of cultural producers, brokers, and audiences. Although politicians in
Germany and the United States became even more aware of the potential power of
culture as a two-edged sword of identity promotion (e.g., Pepsi’s “current-event mar-
keting”) and representational politics (e.g., NEA controversies in the United States;
Christo’s Wrapped Reichstag in Germany), they continued to reduce funding for cul-
ture. Meanwhile, nonprofit organizations such as the Guggenheim and Getty founda-
tions assumed more-visible and more-influential positions through their extensive
acquisition and building projects (e.g., the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao (GMB),
Deutsche Guggenheim Berlin, or the Getty Center in Los Angeles), transforming
themselves into truly global enterprises with their own “brands” of cultural politics
and image promotion.
In Germany, where many corporations are still controlled by private or family in-
terests, new cultural foundations are emerging as major beneficiaries of these private
fortunes and will be significant participants in shaping postunification cultural politics
in the twenty-first century.1 In the United States, the gaps left by budget cuts and new
demands for cultural programming in the 1980s and 1990s were at least partially filled
by foundations, individual donors, and corporate sponsors, as well as by many muse-
ums and performing arts centers, which transformed themselves into semicommercial

22
 Corporate Cultural Politics 23

entities.2 The collaboration of private foundations, public arts institutions, and cor-
porations has supplanted, expanded, and redefined cultural politics. This and subse-
quent chapters will investigate the notion that corporations have institutionalized
their own cultural politics, which play a pivotal role in the nexus of corporate, foun-
dation, and national or regional politics. Despite their relatively small contribution to
cultural funding, corporations participate in defining public and private agendas of
cultural programming in at least three key respects.
First, the corporation produces consumer and media culture by defining the rela-
tions between products and images that construct the contexts and social relations of
everyday life. Andrew Wernick concludes that promotion (promotional culture) has
become the predominant, legitimized mode of communication within most aspects
of society (e.g., politics, education, media) and that it is “virtually co-extensive with
our produced symbolic world” (1991, 182). Gerhard Schulze argues that the actual
experience of consuming the image and the product itself involves a complex inter-
action between the psychological (re)construction of the image and the physical pro-
cess of consuming the product, which enables the individual to establish and replicate
the gratification of consumption. This desire to find and replicate such experiences
is the primary orientation of societies based on experiences and events (Schulze’s
Erlebnisgesellschaft) (1992, 252).
Second, corporate models of institutional operation and management (e.g., in
search of market approval, efficiency) are increasingly accepted as legitimate by gov-
ernment, nonprofit, and educational institutions. Although the corporation draws on
social and psychological techniques from other spheres, it adapts and redefines them
in terms of corporate objectives and disseminates them for use by nonprofit institu-
tions. In this respect, corporations have a significant impact by establishing the rela-
tions of power among institutions and by shaping the parameters of social legitimacy.
In assessing this influence in the construction of culture, Avery Gordon concludes,
Corporate culture, in the broadest sense, influences and supervises public modes of
governance not simply through conventional corporate influence on state politics, or
through interlocking networks of elites, or through the generalization of the commodi-
ty form . . . but as a model of cultural and social relations. Significant changes in cor-
porate culture not only refashion the corporation, but make the social forms and iden-
tities produced there reign commonsensically in our public and private lives. In other
words, corporate culture strives, particularly when it conceives of itself as a “sustainable
environment,” to become socially dominant. (1995, 18–19)

Third, although nonprofit institutions (e.g., museums, operas, theaters, sympho-

nies) occupy different positions within the cultural marketplace, or in what Schulze
terms the market for experiences (Erlebnismarkt), they share many common interests.
Above all, both commercial and nonprofit institutions strive to maintain institutional
survival by (1) creating legitimacy, (2) cultivating informal relations with policy makers,
(3) securing a certain degree of institutional stability, (4) realizing economic success,
24 Corporate Cultural Politics

and (5) generating a resonance within the audiences they choose to address (Schulze
1992, 504–5). Nor can artists completely disengage themselves from or disregard these
survival strategies. Artistic production is increasingly relativized within a cultural and
experiential marketplace in which the artist assumes positions of collaborator or sup-
plier of conceptual “software” for the projects (i.e., new experiences and events) of-
fered by cultural institutions and corporations (Schulze 1992, 438, 506). Thus, com-
mercial entities (corporations) develop their own forms and strategies of cultural
politics (e.g., sponsorships) in order to maintain and expand their institutional bases
and spheres of influence, while public and nonprofit institutions incrementally adopt
(and modify) corporate strategies in order to guarantee public recognition and finan-
cial stability. New forms of cultural promotion and mediation, such as cultural spon-
sorships, have developed as a result of these converging interests. That is, both corpora-
tions and nonprofits seek legitimacy and audience acceptance.
Certainly, it would be a simplification to speak strictly in terms of corporate cul-
tural hegemony. Corporate cultural politics have emerged, in part, as a result of the corpo-
ration’s response to dynamic social forces (internal and external) over which it can exert
only partial, albeit significant, control. Although much of product culture and promo-
tion is based on recirculating and appropriating existing cultural images (Coca-Cola,
the Marlboro Man, the VW Beetle), product images are also threatened by rapid
obsolescence. From an audience perspective, consumption and reception can be
structured and channeled but not totally programmed. Corporations recognize that
the contexts of cultural production and reception are contested. They are marked by
paradoxes, crises, and forms of resistance that potentially subvert the spaces occupied
by corporate interests, yet this resistance may also present new venues for corporate
cultural programming.3 However, the crises of corporate legitimacy also provide an
aperture for artists who reject sponsorship (e.g., Hans Haacke, Christo and Jeanne-
Claude) to address corporate and public cultural politics in their work. Moreover, as
some products (e.g., tobacco, alcohol, genetically modified foods) have become the
target of social and public-policy agendas in the EU and the United States, the neces-
sity of a cultural programming that operates outside of the traditionally circumscribed
boundaries of material culture becomes more essential for corporations if they are to
maintain their social legitimacy. Rather than valorizing either manipulation or resis-
tance, this study examines aspects of manipulation and resistance by analyzing the
specific contexts of cultural production, dissemination, and reception. It is within the
site-specific production, mediation, and reception of culture that the strategies and
potential for social control or resistance become visible.
As I have suggested in chapter 1, corporate cultural policy and the limits of spon-
sorship have assumed a central position in public-private debates on new directions in
culture, both in the United States and in Germany. At the same time that a major
NEA report on the arts and culture in the United States (American Canvas) was re-
leased, I. Michael Heyman (secretary of the Smithsonian Institution) summarized the
Institution Council’s discussion of corporate sponsorships:
 Corporate Cultural Politics 25

In the past three years, corporate funding has been an important source of additional
revenues for our educational efforts in research, exhibitions and national outreach.
We’re grateful for that help. Unlike in the past, however, corporations now ask more
from us than simple acknowledgment of support. For instance, in return for a sponsor’s
giving to the Smithsonian a percentage of its product sales, or funding an activity or ex-
hibition, the sponsor may ask to use the Institution logo in corporate advertising, iden-
tifying the company as “a proud supporter of the Smithsonian.” (1998, 11)

The experience of the Smithsonian and the concerns of its council speak to core is-
sues of corporate sponsorships. Heyman’s observations illustrate one dimension of a
much larger complex of communicative strategies employed by corporations. Here,
we see several leitmotivs emerge, including (1) the centrality of the event as a medium
that defines and structures the production of culture and the contexts of its reception,
(2) the preeminence of image promotion, or what marketing specialists refer to as “image
transfer,” and (3) the importance of shaping public and social policy through “partner-
ships.” In this case, the institutional image of the Smithsonian becomes an integral
component of constructing and projecting corporate identity through the corpora-
tion’s use of institutional spaces (exhibitions) and modes of signification (logos):
Two of our sponsors made it clear at the Council meeting that the value of the Smith-
sonian to corporations lies in pairing our identity (or “brand”) with that of a corpora-
tion (“co-branding”). In corporate eyes, our well-known identity bespeaks “American,”
“integrity,” “familiarity,” “family,” “history,” “technology,” “art” and similar concepts.
(Heyman 1998, 11)

Whereas corporations once insisted upon the placement of their corporate logos on
advertisements for sponsored projects, the institution’s logo is now transferred to the
corporate advertisement of cultural sponsorship as a stamp of public approval and le-
gitimacy.4 Conversely, the cache of public trust that this approval communicates can
be rapidly spent, “especially in connection with questionable products (tobacco and
alcohol, . . . ), practices (such as providing substandard wages and working condi-
tions) and occurrences (such as deleterious environmental events)” (Heyman 1998,
11). Heyman concludes that the Smithsonian must attempt to balance corporate inter-
ests with those of public policy and its own institutional objectives. In comparison
with past conflicts with the U.S. Congress (which funds the Smithsonian and ap-
points its Board of Regents), he suggests that corporate opposition to Smithsonian proj-
ects may seem minor. Yet the Smithsonian’s discussion of sponsorship in its member-
ship’s magazine illustrates the extent to which corporations have assumed a central
position in defining culture and in structuring the institutions and spaces of public
cultural politics. A brief look at the evolution of corporate involvement in cultural
programming in the United States reveals the gradual expansion of corporate interests
in public cultural politics and the simultaneous legitimation and institutionalization
of sponsorship.
26 Corporate Cultural Politics

Sponsoring: “The New Partnership”

In 1960, Governor Nelson Rockefeller gained legislative approval for the New York
State Council on the Arts. This agency subsequently became an administrative model
for state arts organizations and for the NEA and the National Endowment for the
Humanities (NEH), enacted by Lyndon Johnson in 1965 (Heilbrun and Gray 1993,
229–30). During the late 1950s, large corporations like the Chase Manhattan Bank
and Philip Morris were already engaged in art collecting and modest support of sym-
phonies. The Ford Foundation had been providing grants for symphonies since the
late 1950s and became a major funding source for arts projects. In 1967, David Rocke-
feller (chairman of the board of Chase Manhattan Bank) proposed the Business Com-
mittee for the Arts (BCA) in order to encourage other business leaders to support the
arts, both nationally and regionally ( Jedlicka 1989, 1). The establishment of the BCA
and the political groundwork laid by Nelson Rockefeller signaled a growing con-
sciousness within corporations that cultural promotion could be deployed as an in-
strument of public relations within the public-policy arena. Although David Rocke-
feller stressed notions of social responsibility and “good citizenship” in his speech
proposing the BCA, the economic and public relations value of “the arts” (i.e., pre-
dominantly high culture) were already an integral component of developing external
and internal corporate identity:
It can provide a company with extensive publicity and advertising, a brighter public
reputation, and an improved corporate image. It can build better customer relations, a
readier acceptance of company products, and a superior appraisal of their quality.
Promotion of the arts can improve the morale of employees and help attract qualified
personnel. (Rockefeller 1966, 3)

Rockefeller’s address to business leaders also refers to other forces and interests at work
beyond corporate philanthropy or patronage, for example, architecture as a represen-
tation of corporate identity in urban centers and the use of culture in product design
(5–7). The organization and articulation of corporate interests in “the arts” also be-
came an instrument for maintaining and documenting social legitimacy as corpora-
tions were subject to increased scrutiny in the late 1960s. Two decades later, George
Weissman, former CEO of Philip Morris, referred to the social and cultural forces
that threatened the corporate infrastructure:
Our community was changing in the late 1950’s and the 1960’s—turbulently and radi-
cally on many fronts at the same time—politically, socially, culturally, economically.
Long established cities like Boston, Detroit, Cleveland, Atlanta, Pittsburgh . . . began
to grow old and show serious signs of wear. . . . There was grave concern whether
broken-down neighborhoods—entire cities—our vital communities—had the ability
to repair, revive and recover. . . . Obviously, innovative approaches were needed to run
our businesses, to develop new kinds of ties with the community . . . to make secure
our democratic, capitalistic way of life. We are dealing here with basic, rock-bottom
self-interest. (Weissman 1988, 2)
 Corporate Cultural Politics 27

The BCA and individual corporate programs were a response to a sociopolitical cli-
mate that was perceived as challenging or undermining corporate power in local com-
munities (e.g., corporate resistance to unionization, unregulated economic develop-
ment) and threatening the corporation’s political interests. We will see that corporate
cultural politics is not limited to cultural programming; it also operates increasingly
in the social dimension, that is, through “social sponsorships” at local and national
levels.
At Philip Morris, support for the arts had become an instrument for corporate
identity and market expansion: “Through audacious, original marketing campaigns,
Philip Morris products began capturing ever-larger market shares in the 1950s and
1960s. This boldness and flair for innovation were reflected in the company’s sponsor-
ship of the museum exhibition Pop & Op” (Philip Morris and the Arts 1993, 3). By
1965, Philip Morris had already organized and sponsored the exhibition and U.S. tour
of Pop & Op, featuring works by Roy Lichtenstein, Jasper Johns, and James Rosen-
quist. Corporations had long since recognized the value of aesthetics and design in
marketing, as well as the public-relations value of their own participation in the me-
diation of contemporary culture and lifestyles. Although relatively few corporations
had articulated programs for cultural programming in the 1960s, many realized the
significance of the 1960s counterculture for the design, styling, and packaging of new
products. Thus, manufacturers of consumer products increasingly pursued strategies
of aesthetic appropriation while advancing social agendas that reinforced the legiti-
macy of “the capitalistic way of life,” particularly with respect to corporate interests in
urban centers. The emerging institutionalization of cultural programming was also a
recognition of the centrality of contemporary culture as a function of the new lifestyle
marketing during the early 1970s.
The attractiveness of cultural sponsorships increased dramatically as (popular) cul-
ture’s status within the mass media assumed a heightened social status. In the United
States, the promotional value of sponsorships as an ancillary or complementary form
of addressing target markets and more-sophisticated audiences continued to expand
during the 1970s and 1980s. Sports sponsorships were becoming one of the largest
markets for alcohol and tobacco producers. Philip Morris simultaneously pursued
support of avant-garde culture (in both visual and performing arts) and a public poli-
cy that would favor its products (especially tobacco). Although sports sponsorships
were and are structurally distinct from cultural sponsorships, they provided some ini-
tial experience for subsequent marketing in cultural contexts, especially at events and
festivals. Of course, sports were not considered forms of serious, high culture despite
their widespread appeal even among so-called elites. Yet as the NEA observes, institu-
tionalized forms of high culture were and are not “integrated into our daily lives in
quite the same way that sports are (which is why no less than 12 of the 25 highest rated
television shows of all time were sporting events)” (Larson 1997, 61). Precisely because
professional sports are so embedded in most aspects of global culture—including edu-
cation at all levels, leisure, and management—they have been attractive sites for the
28 Corporate Cultural Politics

projection and construction of identities. However, the reality of these lifestyles (e.g.,
health risks related to the consumption of alcohol and tobacco) also became primary
objects of public policies that threatened corporate interests during the 1990s.
Although during the early 1980s many corporations continued to perceive cultural
programming primarily as philanthropy (or pursued philanthropy and sponsorship),
by the early 1990s financial support for culture had been integrated into corporate
identity, marketing communication, and public affairs. Indeed, the quantitative sig-
nificance of sponsorships (which provided corporate funding or goods and services in
return for the promotional use of the event and institution) was underestimated or not
even registered as “arts support” in many major studies of the arts, in part because such
expenditures in marketing and advertising budgets are largely undisclosed, that is, not
made available to the public (Heilbrun and Gray 1993, 236–37). Alfred Schreiber, a cor-
porate consultant on event sponsorships, observes,
In reality, corporate philanthropy has been almost entirely replaced by cause-related
marketing.
What’s the difference?
Simply that philanthropy was sometimes giving money away. Lifestyle marketing,
of course, gives money too. But it goes beyond that. It shares values. It’s an overt demon-
stration and statement that a company not only gives cash but shares certain attitudes
and beliefs with its consumers.
There is also more of a synergy to lifestyle marketing than to philanthropy.
(1994, 18)

Expenditures for cultural programs were integrated into specific marketing and pro-
motion objectives, based on profitability and a return on investment. Forms of cul-
ture that were not consonant with either product or corporate identity objectives were
eliminated as unsuitable from the outset (Bruhn and Dahlhoff 1989, 62–69; Schreiber
1994, 19). Moreover, contemporary sponsorships position the corporation as a “part-
ner” in regional or community affairs5 and in the formulation of public policy,
demanding a promotional return on investment for products and services and legiti-
mizing corporate interests (economic incentives, labor relations, etc.).6 Although con-
temporary sponsorships may reinforce multiple corporate objectives (cultural, social,
economic), their programming has become more focused and, as we have seen in the
case of the Smithsonian, more demanding, tending to see sponsorships in terms of
specific contractual agreements rather than philanthropy:
A company is giving some tangible asset to the entity it chooses to support, be it money,
technical assistance, marketing advice, exposure, whatever. In return, the corporation
expects very concrete things, which are spelled out in a plan that is jointly approved by
both the sponsor and the organization that gets sponsored. (Schreiber 1994, 18)

The two-pronged objectives of cultural sponsorships—product or image promo-

tion and public-policy impact—are reflected in the evolution of sponsoring in both
 Corporate Cultural Politics 29

North America and Europe (Bruhn and Dahlhoff 1989, 37). On both continents, the
expansion of sports sponsorships preceded cultural sponsorships. Social and environ-
mental sponsorships did not become more widespread until the 1980s in the United
States and the late 1990s in Germany. Cultural sponsorships were more prevalent in
the United States and the United Kingdom than in Germany, where they only gained
importance beginning in the 1990s (Bruhn 1991, 26). Financing German unification
and expansive development projects during the 1980s led to budget cuts at regional
and national levels in the early 1990s. Museums, operas, and theaters searched for al-
ternative funding sources, including sponsors. This expansion of sponsorships in
Germany received further impetus from the privatization of public entities (e.g., of
the rail system, post office, and telecommunications), the emerging markets of the
EU, and corporate globalization, which contributed to a more competitive cultural
marketplace. Both at the federal and regional level, the new cultural politics embraced
corporate-public “partnerships” (Heinrichs 1997, v). After initially being criticized in
the media, corporate participation had become an integral part of Germany’s cultural
marketplace by the mid-1990s.
With the exception of sports sponsorships, some cultural and social sponsorships
have merged. Rock concerts for charitable causes (e.g., for AIDS, Amnesty Inter-
national), festivals, or other events became sites for cause-related fund-raising and cor-
porate representation. Ronald McDonald Houses (for families of children being treat-
ed in nearby hospitals) signified the participation of global corporations in local social
contexts (Dumrath 1992, 31–36). In the late 1990s, the NEA’s American Canvas argued
for an even greater involvement for the arts within the fabric of everyday life in U.S.
communities (Larson 1997, 82–86). In chapter 3, I will examine how this fusion of
various types of sponsoring reflects broader processes of cultural de-differentiation
(between high and low culture) (Lash 1991, 5) or cultural hybridization (between vari-
ous types of culture), processes that blur the boundaries between corporate and public
interests.

Culture as Corporate Communication

The potential for sponsorship is as vast and diverse as the field of contemporary cul-
ture, ranging from support for historic restoration projects (e.g., Mercedes-Benz con-
tributes to Margaret Mitchell’s residence in Atlanta) to support for research on breast
cancer (e.g., BMW makes a donation each time someone test-drives a BMW during a
fund-raiser) to support of contemporary music (e.g., Volkswagen sponsors the Rolling
Stones).7 The “new partnership” (Schreiber 1994, 18–20) among corporations, cultur-
al institutions, and communities, based on events and “cause-related marketing,” at-
tempts to engage audiences on an emotional level, not only through interaction with
the product itself but by organizing and structuring selected sites of cultural produc-
tion and mediation.
Cultural sponsorships have been integrated into corporate identity, communica-
tion, and management philosophy and are increasingly measured through quantitative
30 Corporate Cultural Politics

evaluation. Sponsoring specialist Manfred Bruhn suggests that managers begin the
process of cultural sponsorship by evaluating cultural production in terms of its com-
patibility with the corporation’s own philosophy of cultural support and corporate
identity (Bruhn 1991, 208). Corporations generally base their funding decisions on
three criteria: (1) whether the area of cultural activity (e.g., music, art, film, festivals)
corresponds to the corporation’s own target markets, (2) whether themes and events
have potential for media coverage and resonance, and (3) whether individuals and
groups are “promotable” (Bruhn and Dahlhoff 1989, 74). Although these factors sug-
gest that forms of alternative or marginalized culture may be rejected out of hand, sub-
sequent chapters in this study will show that some avant-garde artists and works may
be attractive precisely because they have high visibility in the media. However, few cor-
porations select projects that overtly criticize their politics and interests.
Schreiber recommends that corporate managers measure the success of sponsor-
ships in relation to (1) the program’s effectiveness in providing more involvement with
participants and audiences (“value-added” dimensions to the actual event), (2) the
project’s potential to attract and engage mass media as a bridge to audiences who can-
not participate in the event, and (3) the project’s potential to involve the corporation’s
customers, sales force, distributors, or wholesalers (1994, 132). Linking popular events
to products is considered “value-added” because it adds audience interaction with the
corporate products or images to the promotional budget that would have been ex-
pended in any case. Concurrent media coverage of sponsored events (frequently in-
cluded in news coverage) is a form of free promotion and is often more effective than
advertising because it is not tuned out or turned off by viewers.
Image and product promotion are amplified by linking sponsored events to in-
store promotions and sales incentives. Events become instruments for market research
and tools for measuring the effectiveness of corporate communication at an event
(Schreiber 1994, 134). For example, an event’s organizers distribute coupons that are
redeemable at fast-food restaurants, which in turn promote the event (so-called cross-
promotion). Such “point-of-sale” cross-promotion was used for the Benson & Hedges
Blues Festival:
Benson & Hedges . . . places a free “on pack” cassette of music from the festival on their
cartons. So the consumer who buys a carton of Benson & Hedges also gets a free cas-
sette of blues hits. In this way, Benson & Hedges drives the overall idea that it is giving
a nationwide series of musical events by giving customers a taste of it at the local level.
(Schreiber 1994, 134)

Despite heightened restrictions on tobacco advertising in the EU and the United

States, it remains to be seen to what extent such forms of product promotion can or
will be regulated, particularly when organizers become dependent upon sponsored
funding.8
By sponsoring a successful event, corporations gain leverage with distributors at the
local or regional level. Leveraging can be used to induce or pressure reluctant retailers
to offer corporate goods and services. Schreiber explains that American Express lever-
 Corporate Cultural Politics 31

aged the Liza Minnelli, Frank Sinatra, and Sammy Davis Jr. tour Together Again by
“inform[ing] theaters that they could only present the concert if they began to accept
the American Express card in their future box-office operations” (1994, 19). Sponsors
may actually “buy” a successful annual event (e.g., a music festival) or create their own
events in order to achieve greater control over its production and communication.
Events can be licensed to other cosponsors, and the corporate owners may make a
profit by successfully marketing their event (Schreiber 1994, 146).
While some sponsorships are utilized as vehicles for product promotion, others are
primarily engaged to promote product or corporate images. Philip Morris sponsors
the tour of the Philip Morris Superband in the United States as image promotion, but
it also distributes cigarettes at international art exhibitions such as the documenta or
at the Filmfest München as product promotion. What is most significant, however, is
that both of these activities are carried out within contexts signified as cultural sites.
Despite structural or organizational distinctions between product sponsoring and
image sponsoring (Bruhn and Dahlhoff 1989, 64–68), sponsoring practice indicates a
de-differentiation of product and image. Attempts by corporations to distinguish be-
tween product (sponsoring) and image (sponsoring) reflect marketing and distribu-
tion strategies rather than the actual contexts of consumption that fuse the physical
and psychological aspects of experiencing consumption, a fusion that Schulze has de-
fined as Erlebnis (1992, 422). The development of sponsoring as an instrument of cor-
porate communication contributes to this process of de-differentiation because it
most commonly occurs on the boundaries of product and image (Wernick 1991, 184).
Thus, product sponsoring invokes image sponsoring and vice versa. However, the
image has gained a more important status in the signification of the product (Wernick
1991, 92–123; Stolorz 1992, 55). The mediation of product and corporate images
through sponsored projects is an intrinsic feature of the cultural politics of the corpo-
ration. Because the products and images function within dynamic and volatile socio-
cultural and political contexts in which they are rapidly relativized, destabilized, or
made obsolete, they must be recycled, reinvented, or reinscribed with meaning. The
cultural politics of the corporation increasingly require it to explore, occupy, and re-
define social boundaries in order to maintain economic, political, and social legitimacy.

Defining a Politics of Corporate Space

Corporate headquarters are the most visible locus of corporate image and power. They
signify a politics of place or space, that is, of the corporation’s economic, political, and
cultural status, either within urban centers or as a rural campus. Not only do these
buildings function as promotional signs for the corporation and the city, but they also
often become synonymous with urban skylines and rural landscapes—for example,
Mies van der Rohe’s Seagrams Building or Philip Johnson’s postmodernist AT&T
Building in New York, the BMW headquarters and BMW Museum in Munich, Nor-
man Foster’s Shanghai Bank in Hong Kong, or Frank Lloyd Wright’s Johnson Wax
Building in Wisconsin (Roth 1989, 83–84). Architecture simultaneously externalizes
and fuses corporate identity with corporate design. The representational aspects of
32 Corporate Cultural Politics

corporate design—from product packaging to the design of corporate environments

and spaces—address both external audiences (consumers, politicians, competitors,
collaborators, shareholders) and internal ones (management and employees) by medi-
ating values and identities.
Karla Fohrbeck argues that corporate design fulfills two related social needs: (1) It
reinforces the desire for social differentiation, individuality, innovation, and distinc-
tive lifestyles while (2) providing structures and symbols that support the need for
community, for shared identities and meanings (Fohrbeck and Wiesand 1989, 28). As
a function of corporate identity, corporate architecture attempts to simultaneously
represent innovation, distinction, creativity, and individuality while ensuring a sense
of orientation, community, and partnership. Both dimensions of corporate identity
and design relate to the conceptualization of cultural sponsorships and corporate cul-
tural politics.
Corporate architecture functions as a marker for historical and spatial narratives,
that is, for the way corporate buildings define and structure social interaction within
the building while also shaping physical, social, and economic spaces surrounding
it. IBM’s founder, Thomas Watson, selected rural sites in order to isolate employees
from the “temptations of urban life” that would supposedly decrease productivity
(Erben 1992, 64). Of course, the idea of creating communities of workers—for ex-
ample, as factory and mining towns or as social communes—is well documented in
the social history of labor relations. But Watson’s patriarchal attitude was also intend-
ed to geographically distance IBM and its employees from the competition by reduc-
ing the flow of information and personnel to competitors while controlling the envi-
ronments within which employees lived and worked. More specifically, it was an
attempt to structure “intact” external social environments in order to ensure a stable
business environment (Erben 1992, 64–65). However, corporations recognized (par-
ticularly during the 1960s and 1970s) that attempts to control social environments,
predicated on nineteenth-century notions of corporate patriarchy, were obsolete and
counterproductive.
In fact, it was the corporation itself that destroyed any vestiges of intact communi-
ties by exploiting the commercial potential of the media and mass-market advertising
beginning in the 1950s in the United States. However, the goal of structuring social
environments in order to maintain productivity and promote local corporate interests
was not abandoned but, rather, redefined as “community partnerships.” At IBM,
sponsoring philosophy is directly related to community partnerships that “serve to
create an intact environment,” for example, through sponsorships in schools near
IBM’s former corporate headquarters in Sindelfingen, Germany (Erben 1992, 66).
Although corporations frequently claim to cultivate their own distinctive corporate
culture internally, corporate identity externally asserts the corporate interest as an in-
tegral part of all communities.

Figure 2.1. IBM shapes educational policy at local levels through product technologies and community partnerships.
34 Corporate Cultural Politics

Although the site selection for corporate headquarters is still based on economic
criteria (e.g., real estate prices, tax abatements), quality of life, or potential for creative
synergy, corporate globalization and telecommunication have eliminated many of the
differences between rural, suburban, and urban sites. Corporate headquarters attempt
to create shared communal spaces (such as atria, plazas, dining areas, fitness centers,
daycare facilities) and individualized spaces (particularly for management) while
maintaining hierarchies of power through spatial or territorial relations (e.g., space
allocation, interior design). Internally, corporate design shares a common orientation
to social spaces and structuring relations between the individual and communities. In
this sense, the corporate workplace is redefined as a communal living space or a com-
munity of shared values that eliminates difference. The campus architecture of high-
tech corporations—enhanced by collaborative working groups and teams—ostensibly
erased the spatial hierarchies symbolized by the corporate penthouse in an urban sky-
scraper. Working communities were redefined and spatially recontextualized through
corporate design and corporate culture. Simultaneously, beginning in the 1970s, cor-
porate architecture was reconceptualized in order to project a corporate image in har-
mony with a heightened environmental consciousness. Artist Dan Graham observes,
While postwar use of transparent glass windows for the corporate office buildings made
its function and employees visible to the public, by the seventies, two-way mirrored
windows had replaced transparent windows. This new corporate facade reflected the
outside environment while allowing employees the security of an unseen view out-
side. . . . The corporate edifice, reflecting the exterior environment, could then be iden-
tified with the sky. The building’s outer skin reflected sunlight and heat, conserving en-
ergy, and the facade read and functioned as “ecological.” (1995, 130–31)

In his installation Two-Way Mirror Cylinder inside Cube and Video Salon: Rooftop Park
for Dia Center for the Arts (1991), Graham addresses the exclusion of the spectator and
others represented by the two-way mirrored windows, which “do not allow visual
penetration by the spectator of the interior, but give the interior viewer a transparent
view of the exterior” (1995, 127). Graham’s interpretation and mediation of the two-
way mirrored windows define a politics of corporate space as containment (for those
within) and exclusion (for those outside).
An integral component of contemporary corporate cultural politics is the attempt to
make community interests synonymous, or at least compatible, with corporate inter-
ests and to manage social diversity within corporate environments. Gordon discusses
the redefinition of multicultural diversity in terms of diversity management:
The management of racial and gender identities and conflicts, or what is otherwise
known as diversity management, is a core component of the new corporate culture.
Contemporary corporate culture does not demand assimilationism quite as we have
known it, nor does it require undifferentiated social control. Corporate culture links a
vision of racial and gender diversity to its existing relations of ruling to produce some-
 Corporate Cultural Politics 35

thing that might be called multicultural corporatism. This vision of corporate multi-
culturalism has the potential to become an influential feature of the larger project . . .
of rewriting our nation’s basic social contract. (1995, 2)

Corporate architecture addresses both social policy (e.g., diversity issues) and public
space by redefining the relations between the corporation and those spaces that it oc-
cupies or dominates. New headquarters buildings are promoted as part of urban or
regional revitalization projects and jobs initiatives, which communicate a positive
public-relations image (e.g., that the corporation has “invested” in urban projects).
Corporate buildings integrate public and social spaces by including retail spaces
and entertainment venues. Rockefeller Center—with its skating rink, annual Christ-
mas tree display, cafés, bookstores, and NBC’s corporate headquarters and television
studios, with public windows and street-level broadcasts—exemplifies the hybridiza-
tion of corporate and public spaces and is one of the early models of “mixed-use de-
velopment” (MUD) (Snedcof 1985, 13). A significant feature of this hybridization of
corporate and public spaces is the integration of museums into the corporate head-
quarters. The main lobby of Philip Morris’s corporate headquarters in New York City
became the site of a branch of the Whitney Museum. Many corporate centers, like
BMW’s, also house company museums. Graham observes that the IBM Atrium and
Museum collapses traditional images of nature, as well as distinctions between public
and private spaces: “The atrium functions essentially as a lobby for the attached,
underground Museum of Science and Art, and marks another moment in corporate
space, when corporate sponsorship of public museums became common in New York
in the seventies” (1995, 131).9
In a similar fashion, corporate plazas, situated on the boundary between public and
corporate spaces, become venues for corporate self-promotion, including sponsored
events and commissioned artworks. Artist Richard Serra refers to the difficulties of es-
tablishing a separate space for art within such sites:
Usually you’re offered places which have specific ideological connotations, from parks
to corporate and public buildings and their extensions such as lawns and plazas. It’s
difficult to subvert those contexts. That’s why you have so many corporate baubles on
Sixth Avenue [New York], so much bad plaza art that smacks of IBM, signifying its cul-
tural awareness. . . . But there is no neutral site. Every context has its frame and its ideo-
logical overtones. It’s a matter of degree. There is one condition that I want, which is a
density of traffic flow. (Quoted in Crimp 1993, 169)

Like Serra, Judith Baca directs our attention to the functions of commissioned art as a
representation of the relations between urban spaces and communities:
By their daily presence in our lives, these artworks intend to persuade us of the justice of
the acts they represent. The power of the corporate sponsor is embodied in the sculpture
standing in front of the towering office building. These grand works, like their military
predecessors in the parks, inspire a sense of awe by their scale and the importance of the
36 Corporate Cultural Politics

artist. Here, public art is unashamed in its intention to mediate between the public and
the developer. (1996, 132)

Corporate cultural politics and corporate space are reproduced through the prolif-
eration of real estate development or MUD projects that integrate cultural program-
ming. In Austin, Texas, developer J. Burton Casey explains that his firm utilized the arts
as a promotional vehicle to create a “feeling that it was avant-garde /cutting-edge to
locate in that part of the city rather than feeling as if they were moving to the slums”
(1986, 6). The project provided 45,000 square feet of studio space for one hundred
local artists at cost (allocated from the firm’s promotion budget) and established a
children’s museum staffed by engineers from the aerospace corporation Lockheed
(Casey 1986, 6).10 Such projects underscore the extent to which notions of urban
planning remain inherently based on a corporate politics of containment and social
displacement.11
Many of the cultural centers within MUDs, which began to proliferate in urban
areas beginning in the 1970s, were either dedicated to high culture (concert halls, thea-
ters, and museums), with its affluent audiences and donors, or entertainment and
shopping complexes (Snedcof 1985, 11–35). As corporations became institutionalized
as cultural promoters and brokers rather than simply urban patrons, they acquired
properties in strategic locations in order to develop their own cultural centers, height-
en their image, and promote their interests in local cultural politics. Certainly, the de-
velopment of “cultural real estate” in the 1990s marked a significant shift from the
high-culture properties of the 1970s and 1980s to the mass-entertainment complexes
operated by multinational corporations in Berlin; New York; Orlando, Florida; Las
Vegas; Hollywood; and even Branson, Missouri. (Disney had ensured its own com-
pletely autonomous local government through massive land acquisitions and develop-
ment plans in Orlando—including the planned community Celebration—plans that
were eagerly accepted by local and state government.)12
Although the MUDs and cultural centers of the 1970s were not as widespread in
Germany, one need look no further than the multinational development projects
(e.g., by Daimler and Sony) in Berlin of the 1990s in order to gain a sense of the sig-
nificance corporations attach to the utilization of local and global spaces. Indeed,
Berlin’s Potsdamer Platz project (opened in 1998) reflected urban redevelopment and
corporate image on an enormous scale, including
the new Marlene-Dietrich-Platz, a new 12,000 square meter water feature, 18 residen-
tial blocks, 620 apartments, 30 restaurants, cafés, and bars, in addition to a musical thea-
ter, a casino, multiplex cinemas, a Grand Hotel, 110 retail outlets, and 175,000 square
feet of commercial office space. This is all Daimler-Town, the Daimler-Dream.13

In terms of a corporate politics of space, Potsdamer Platz was an opportunity for

emerging transnational corporations (e.g., DaimlerChrysler) to physically assert their
presence locally at the crossroads of eastern and western Europe and within the politi-
 Corporate Cultural Politics 37

cal contexts of the new capital (and thus adding their own “corporate embassies” to
the ranks of national representation), meanwhile validating their participation in
urban life by providing venues for the production and consumption of culture.
While media and entertainment corporations, such as Disney, may be among the
most visible forces in urban (e.g., Broadway and Forty-second Street development)
and regional (e.g., Orlando, Florida) cultural politics in the United States, many cor-
porations “outside” of the culture industry (e.g., DaimlerChrysler) do not only spon-
sor culture; they also develop and structure the physical spaces of social interaction
and simultaneously employ them as an articulation and legitimation of their interests
in local public policy. The Ford Motor Corporation joined the Times Square develop-
ment at Broadway and Forty-second Street by establishing the Ford Center for the
Performing Arts as a venue for musical attractions.14 Such projects establish corpora-
tions, like Ford, as cultural promoters and mediators of urban tourism and demarcate
corporations’ territorial, cultural, and political interests beyond the domain of corpo-
rate headquarters—in this case by allying themselves with political interests that re-
defined the urban space in order to expel “undesirable elements” (i.e., adult video out-
lets, the homeless, muggers, drug addicts). Rosalyn Deutsche has studied the double
bind of urban gentrification (for government and corporations) during the 1970s and
1980s, which promoted the interests of developers but also threatened to displace the
pool of cheap labor within inner cities (1998, 15–16).15
Central to such debates is a politics of space, which, as Susan Willis observes, erases
the distinctions between publicly funded spaces and private property, a difference that
“fundamentally defines our social practices and relationships” (1995, 182–83). This
underscores the fact that economic, social, and political interests are embedded in
both “private” and “public” spaces. Deutsche problematizes the very distinctions be-
tween “public” and “space,” rejecting classical dichotomies of spaces:
For no space, insofar as it is social, is a simply given, secure, self-contained entity that
precedes representation; its very identity as a space, its appearance of closure, is consti-
tuted and maintained through discursive relationships that are themselves material and
spatial—differentiations, repressions, subordinations, domestications, attempted ex-
clusions. (1998, 374–75n121)

Paul Virilio argues that “more than Venturi’s Las Vegas, it is Hollywood that merits
urbanist scholarship,” for it is Hollywood that problematized the notion of the stable
image and a sense of place through the construction of imagined environments (sets)
and their transformation into the equally unstable, fleeting images of the screen (1997,
389–90).16 Whereas Virilio, like Jean Baudrillard, theorizes the dissolution of real en-
vironments, I would argue that the virtual environments of film or cyberspace also in-
crease the desire for physically occupying and sensing other spaces, even if they too are
not real. The sense of “being there,” of experiencing events and places symbolically,
cognitively, and physically (i.e., Schulze’s erleben) is also reflected in John Urry’s no-
tion of “consuming places” (1995, 28, 149). Moreover, such themed environments are,
38 Corporate Cultural Politics

as Fredric Jameson concluded in his analysis of John Portman’s Bonaventure Hotel,

not interchangeable (1997, 242–45). Disney has had to reexamine its concepts of
themed environments, in part to compensate for the proliferation of its own and
other themed environments outside of Disney World, environments that define much
of everyday social reality (Waldrep 1995, 221–22).
Although corporations play a major role in structuring the environments of social
interaction, these sites perform different functions for, and are experienced in multiple
modes by, audiences. Marianne Conroy suggests a more differentiated reading of the
contexts and functions of themed environments such as outlet malls, arguing that
specific sites influence the use and meaning of the commodity in very different ways
(1998, 77). These perspectives shift the emphasis to the audience and to social inter-
action rather than to the forces of institutional control.
As Sophie Watson and Katherine Gibson observe, postmodernist interventions
have exposed the assumptions of modernist planning: “the notion that cities can be
made better, that outcomes are knowable, that order and rationality should and can
replace chaos and irrationality; the ideology of progress, and some notion of the better
good” (1995a, 258). “Planning in a postmodernist environment” is a recognition that
urban spaces are occupied by diverse and conflicting forces that should be engaged
democratically rather than contained, expelled, or repressed. Deutsche also conceives
of social space as inherently “produced and structured by conflicts” (1998, xxiv). But
how does urban planning integrate the forces of social conflict or promote social re-
form without becoming a vehicle for control?
Although Watson and Gibson question the degree to which planning is possible if
it is based on contingency and indeterminacy, they underscore the necessity of re-
thinking the manner in which spaces are conceptualized, and particularly the inter-
play between forces of mainstream culture and of cultures that have been marginal-
ized within the contested territories of urban space (1995a, 259, 262–63). Baca proposes
that artists (particularly those from marginalized communities) have a responsibility
to become involved in “the invention of systems of ‘voice giving’ for those left with-
out public venues in which to speak” (1996, 137–38). In a similar vein, artist and com-
munity activist Mary Ann Mears suggests that cultural projects be included in grant
applications for federal economic development funding that the U.S. government has
allocated for “empowerment zones.” In doing so, artists and marginalized commu-
nities become participants in economic revitalization projects (cited in Larson 1997,
128–29).

The Globalization of Corporate Cultural Politics: Sponsoring Diversity and Creativity

The processes of de-territorialization are indicative of cultural de-differentiation and
globalization. Thus, themed environments become part of everyday landscapes and
vice versa; sociopolitical boundaries between public spaces and private spaces are
blurred. As Waters points out, theories of globalization define it as a process of simul-
taneous homogenization and differentiation (1996, 136, 139). This tension between
 Corporate Cultural Politics 39

homogenizing and differentiating tendencies is manifest in the complex relations of

corporate cultural politics. Waters concludes that analyses of globalization are pri-
marily based on relationships between social organization and territoriality, which are
characterized by three central functions of exchange: material exchanges localize, po-
litical exchanges internationalize, and symbolic exchanges globalize (8–9). With re-
spect to our discussion of corporate cultural politics, these dimensions relate to
• the dissemination of material products and the simultaneous communication of
product images at local or regional sites;
• the articulation of corporate political interests (locally, nationally, and international-
ly) via cultural and social sponsorships;
• the communication of corporate and product images globally.

Of course, these processes, such as material and symbolic exchange, occur simultane-
ously on multiple levels and in multiple territories.
Sponsorships and cultural programming represent sites at which cultural, econom-
ic, and political interests converge and are negotiated. Departments of cultural pro-
gramming within corporations form institutional and administrative centers for the
mediation of corporate cultural politics. Rather than simply responding to funding
requests from artists, nonprofit agencies, or public institutions (museums, theaters,
symphonies), the corporate “Cultural Programs” departments often create their own
programming concepts and seek suitable partners to develop and implement them.
Public-relations firms specializing in sponsorships may also be engaged in the process
of identifying projects that will meet corporate image or product objectives. The
European Sponsoring Exchange (Europäische Sponsoring-Börse, ESB) provides semi-
nars, information on organizations seeking sponsors, and listings for sponsors on its
Web site.17 Whereas some corporations (e.g., DaimlerChrysler) administratively sepa-
rate sponsorships from product-oriented public relations, others, such as Philip
Morris, tend to overlap the two functions (Grüßer 1992, 35).
Because the distinctions between product and image have become increasingly
fluid, much of sponsoring is ultimately tied to public-relations and corporate-image
objectives. Regardless of their designations, the departments of cultural programming
have become an integral component in the articulation of corporate cultural politics.
Although there are considerable differences in the forms of culture they sponsor (both
high and low) and the manner in which they organize their participation (e.g., from
product promotion to image transfer), these positions reflect the extensive function of
corporations in the construction of image and product cultures and subcultures.
Several examples of the activities of cultural programming departments illustrate the
globalization of corporate cultural politics, in terms of both the homogenizing and
the differentiating tendencies outlined above.
In articulating their “sponsoring philosophy,” departments of cultural program-
ming frequently refer to notions of creativity and innovation in order to define and
40 Corporate Cultural Politics

legitimize their participation in the cultural marketplace—both as producers and con-

sumers. This is part of the “new partnership” (Schreiber 1994)—a new “social con-
tract” (Gordon 1995) that inserts corporate interests into communities. Creativity and
innovation provide the link between artists (or cultural institutions) and products,
services, and corporate image. At DaimlerChrysler Aerospace (DASA, formerly
Deutsche Aerospace), a subsidiary of DaimlerChrysler, support for young artists is
linked to the firm’s history, image, and corporate art collections. DASA’s cultural pro-
gram creates a historical narrative that is synchronized with corporate image goals:
The history of Deutsche Aerospace has been forged by the pioneer spirit of our compa-
ny’s founding fathers. And visionary thinking combined with innovative capabilities
are still the major elements that shape our enterprise today.
It is thus in keeping with this spirit at Deutsche Aerospace that we welcome an
artistic vision of our company.18

The text reference to “founding fathers” evokes images of a history of patriarchal tra-
dition and individual entrepreneurship, although DASA was only created during the
early 1990s to consolidate Daimler-Benz acquisitions (Dornier, MBB [Messerschmitt-
Bölkow-Blohm], MTU [Motoren- und Turbinen-Union], and Telefunken System-
technik) under a common corporate roof. On the other hand, DASA’s corporate iden-
tity as a young, dynamic, and creative corporation is underscored in the text and in
the title of its initial cultural program: “A Young Corporation Supports Young Artists.”
The project provided stipends for artists to visit the production sites of Deutsche
Aerospace subsidiaries, record their impressions in various media (e.g., painting,
sculpture), and subsequently exhibit their works in the Munich headquarters.
At BMW, creativity and innovation form the core of the discursive structure of
cultural programming:
The culture of our time transports New Thinking. This culture is—at least in the vari-
ous facets of it that BMW perceives, supports, and shows—open to innovation and ex-
periment. Cultural action creates new horizons, illuminating and expanding at the very
least our present perspective.19

Like DASA, BMW presents the development of new product technologies as an artis-
tic endeavor:
A spiritual affinity, indeed a community, connects us with the culture of our time, with
experiment and innovation. Cultural and industrial spheres are searching for the
worlds we will live in tomorrow. Thus, whenever we connect art and technology in cul-
tural presentations, we are utilizing this affinity.20

This marriage of art and technology, facilitated by cultural programming, is trans-

ferred to futuristic product development and is celebrated as a new “boundary cross-
ing.”21 Similar texts articulating the objectives and philosophies of multinational cor-
porations are well documented in the professional literature on public relations and
 Corporate Cultural Politics 41

corporate identity and will be examined in depth in the subsequent chapters of this
study.22 Although most corporations with established sponsorship programs (e.g.,
American Express, BMW, DaimlerChrysler, Philip Morris) encourage their national
subsidiaries to develop their own sponsorship programs, they also reconfigure success-
ful programs for foreign consumption or support projects that will be accessible to
international audiences (e.g., art exhibitions). Thus, sponsoring follows the corporate
mantra “Think globally, act locally.”
A key feature of this globalization process is the transfer of philosophies of man-
agement and corporate identity within and between multinational corporations. This
has led to the dissemination of a common but by no means unified corpus of multi-
national management philosophies and consulting practices. Certainly, multinational
mergers and acquisitions in manufacturing, communication, and service industries
(e.g., DaimlerChrysler, Bertelsmann–Random House) and increasing concentration
among accounting and consulting firms (e.g., Ernst & Young, KPMG, or McKinsey)
have accelerated the standardization of management and personnel philosophies as
well as of evaluation and assessment practices. This process has been facilitated by
(1) the identification by business consultants from academia or public relations of cul-
ture and lifestyle as productive markets and (2) the professionalization of cultural pro-
gramming in corporations in the United States during the early 1960s and in Ger-
many at the end of the 1970s.
With respect to sponsoring, there has also been a gradual trend toward standardiza-
tion of sponsoring objectives and philosophies, based on a significant body of manage-
ment literature published during the early 1990s (in particular, the work of Manfred
Bruhn, who established a framework for sponsoring in Germany). Within the EU and
the United States, there is a general consensus on the objectives or motivations for
sponsoring, including (1) image transfer, (2) social responsibility, (3) contact with cus-
tomers and markets (and product promotion), (4) employee motivation (in the work-
place and at special events), and (5) the personal interests of corporate executives
(Bruhn 1991, 224–32; Hummel 1993, 60–64; Schreiber 1994, 102–4).
The globalization of corporate identity is, as Ulf Hannerz discusses, articulated by
management gurus, such as Kenichi Ohmae, who foresee the dissolution of national
and multinational corporate identities into new, transnational, collective identities
(Hannerz 1996, 85–86). Again, such collective identities employ notions of creativity,
visionary thinking, innovation, and the construction of new historical narratives. Re-
ferring to Ohmae’s transnational (versus multinational) corporation of the near future,
Hannerz observes, “In the shared life and personal ties of the corporation, it is implied,
cultural resonance can again be found. The corporation may even have a history, a
mythology of the past, and celebrate it. More certainly, it will offer some vision for the
future” (86). This is precisely what DaimlerChrysler did in order to facilitate the fusion
of Daimler-Benz and Chrysler, picturing the founding fathers (Gottlieb Daimler, Carl
Benz, and Walther Chrysler) on its new stock certificates and creating the motto
(which appeared on employee PCs the day of the merger) “The future starts today.”23
42 Corporate Cultural Politics

Like Hannerz, Pierre Bourdieu addresses the sociological dimension of global cor-
porate culture. Highly educated and culturally sophisticated management elites, un-
like the cultural philistines of the nineteenth century, find a receptive vehicle in the
mass media for the articulation of their own pseudophilosophies (Bourdieu and
Haacke 1995, 30):
Today’s owners are, often, very refined people, at least in terms of social strategies of
manipulation, but also in the realm of art, which easily becomes part of the bourgeois
style of life, even if it is the product of heretical ruptures and veritable symbolic revolu-
tions. (Bourdieu and Haacke 1995, 41)

With the assistance of journalists and public-relations specialists, corporate leaders

utilize the media in order to promote corporate interests and maintain their legiti-
macy (Bourdieu and Haacke 1995, 30). Management best-sellers, such as Corporate
Cultures: The Rights and Rituals of Corporate Life (Terrence Deal and Allan Kennedy)
or In Search of Excellence (Thomas Peters and Robert Waterman), which were widely
received in Germany and the EU, contributed to the dissemination of management
philosophy and influenced social policy by transferring administrative models to pub-
lic and nonprofit institutions.24 Management elites, educated in the West, also export
corporate culture from the mainstream of urban economic centers (Frankfurt,
London, New York, Tokyo) to the peripheries of the so-called Third World (Hannerz
1996, 139). The “new managers” cultivate a self-image of artist-entrepreneur and have
also joined social milieus characterized by a greater need for self-realization and fulfill-
ment (Schulze 1992, 313). Ulrich Wever, an executive with IBM and the Hypo-Bank
in Germany, characterizes the founders and inventors of firms as nonconformists or
outsiders, or what he terms “a social avant-garde” who are willing to cross established
boundaries and who cannot be pigeonholed (1992, 93).
The contemporary manager is a projection of the corporation’s own promotion
and advertising, that is, young, active, dynamic, well educated, mobile (with experi-
ence abroad), and culturally sophisticated—as comfortable at the opening of a new
art exhibition as in the office. Indeed, the managerial elite perceives itself as a contem-
porary patron of the arts—for example, Michel Roux’s ostensible patronage of artists
for the Absolut Vodka promotion. Yet creativity is also reconfigured as social control.
Herbert Lachmeyer proposes that management uses “creative chaos” to increase pro-
ductivity by altering administrative routines (which, paradoxically, form the basis of
their own efficiency models) and by threatening to terminate those who are not suffi-
ciently adaptable:
Given this context, the idea that the mass of “anonymous undead” office workers
can become more motivated through a bit of creativity requires the belief of the em-
ployees that the practice of their profession is simultaneously a part of their own self-
realization: “corporate culture” as the apotheosis of “corporate identity.” (1992, 44)

Ultimately and most importantly, however, the identity of the manager as creative
artist, both privately and professionally, is as much a construct as are the products and
 Corporate Cultural Politics 43

images he or she promotes. Such constructs also apply to the notion of corporate
identity for the new transnational corporations, which rely on national historical nar-
ratives or product mythologies (as in the case of DASA and BMW).25
An illustration of the promotional merger of corporate professionals as managers
with their personal identities as artists is provided by management consultant and
business professor Gertrud Höhler, who posed for an American Express advertise-
ment.26 The photograph of Höhler mounted on her jumping horse was taken by
“celebrity photographer” Annie Leibovitz as part of an American Express advertising
campaign in Germany, “Portraits” (including photographs of German celebrities), de-
signed to address younger, upwardly mobile customers (see chapter 4). By identifying
themselves as artists—based on the notion that managerial creativity is synonymous
with artistic creativity—management elites have attempted to reestablish the aura of
the artist’s personality and artistic genius as a function of entrepreneurship (Hans
Haacke, cited in Römer 1992, 64). This aspect is completely attuned to the desire of
sponsors to present themselves as cultural producers (creative artist-entrepreneurs)
and associate themselves with the sponsored culture (of other artists). The attraction
of culture for the sponsors resides in its representation as Other or “exotic” and in its
resulting communicative potential as a medium of corporate cultural politics. How-
ever, this process is simultaneously undermined by the corporation’s own promotion-
al strategies and the proliferation of consumer products, which relativize the status of
auratic art through mass production.

“Art Cars,” Five Continents, and Museum for the Workplace

The globalization of corporate cultural politics is not only evident in the manner in
which corporate products and services are used as components of sponsorship pro-
grams (e.g., Sony provides monitors for video-art exhibitions; Lufthansa transports
art exhibitions), but also in the promotion of the product itself as a work of art.
Product culture as culture per se—ostensibly breaking down the barriers between
high and low under the banner of pluralism—is very much a part of corporate cultur-
al politics (see chapter 3).
BMW’s “Art Cars” project exemplifies the intersection of globalization, creativity,
and technology in cultural programming. After Alexander Calder painted a BMW rac-
ing car for his friend, driver Hervé Poulain, in 1975, BMW commissioned “rolling can-
vases” by Frank Stella, Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol, Ernst Fuchs, Robert Rausch-
enberg, Michael Jagamara Nelson, Ken Done, Matazo Kayama, César Manrique,
A. R. Penck, Esther Mahlangu, and Sandro Chia (BMW Art Car Collection 1991; 1993).
Almost as a disclaimer, BMW introduces the BMW Art Car Collection brochure with a
discussion of contemporary and artistic responses to automotive technology (even in-
cluding more-critical treatments, such as artist Ed Kienholz’s Back Seat Dodge [1964]
[BMW Art Car Collection 1991, n.p.]). According to BMW, each of the subsequent
portraits of the artists and their works in the catalog “allow the observer to take a fresh,
undistorted view of a key symbol of modern civilization and lifestyle” (BMW Art Car
Collection 1991, n.p.).
44 Corporate Cultural Politics

Figure 2.2. The car as canvas: creativity, speed, and technology in the BMW Art Cars Collection.

“Art Cars” certainly draws the spectator’s attention to the iconic status of the auto-
mobile by elevating the mass-produced product to a work of art endowed with its
own unique aura by virtue of the individualized treatment of the artists. However, the
works seen in the Collection reinforce the fetishization of the automobile as an expres-
sion of the individual, power, speed, mobility, and collecting but the project does not
simultaneously explore the critical implications of these social narratives: highway fa-
talities (there are no speed limits on the Autobahn), environmental issues, urban ex-
pansion. On the political front, the German automobile industry, including BMW
and Volkswagen ( VW ), continues to resist speed limits, calling them “measures from
the stone age.”27 Nor does the Collection address the specific historical and ideological
functions of the automobile (e.g., the history of manufacturers such as VW ) and of
the Autobahn, either in terms of its development under National Socialism or later as
 Corporate Cultural Politics 45

the material and symbolic disjuncture of two German nations (as thematized in Hans
Haacke’s installation Cast Concrete [1997]; Buchloh 1997, 414). In the BMW Art Car
Collection, the automobile assumes the dominant position, as a canvas and filter, for
individualized, artistic expressions that are thus largely reduced to a secondary, deco-
rative function. The automobile itself becomes the canvas and medium for artistic ex-
pression while the artists’ own interpretations and expressions must, ultimately, be
subordinated and conform to the medium, rather than challenging or subverting it.
The designations “art” and “collection” attempt to establish the works as auratic
rather than interchangeable, mass-produced products. In addition to its own BMW
Museum at corporate headquarters in Munich and an extensive sponsorship program,
BMW established BMW Galleries and Pavilions in key urban centers (Munich, The
Hague, New York, Toronto) in order to project its corporate image through art—
including displays of the latest “Art Cars.” BMW defines the role of the Galleries and
Pavilions:
Again and again, at these sites it is a matter of working with art to risk something new.
Artists situate the conditions of life in our world. Thus we too act, as we are called
upon, to also improve our world in the sense of mobility.28

What is not mentioned here, however, is that the BMW Pavilions and Galleries were
also promotional spaces for marketing new automobiles, located in high-density
urban markets. The Munich gallery, for example, displayed cars upstairs and artworks
(including art cars) on the lower level, and it is listed in the local telephone directory
under “exhibition, sales, gallery.” The pavilions were also transformed into sales areas
for extensive BMW merchandising of its own clothing, luggage, accessories, and
miniatures—all of which was sold in its own catalog, BMW Lifestyle.
The “Art Cars” are dually signified as artworks to be viewed for their uniqueness
and as promotional symbols for all BMW products. As an articulation of local cultur-
al politics, the pavilions define a space within which the corporation can operate in
both cultural and commercial modes, indeed, merging the two but by no means al-
lowing alternative or dissonant voices to encroach on those sites. Moreover, the “Art
Cars” and galleries facilitate the globalization of this merger, both by promoting new
products in international markets and by inscribing them with the aura of the “exotic”
or “multicultural” through artist commissions. The paintings on a BMW 525i, paint-
ed in the tradition of the Ndebele tribe by Esther Mahlangu (born in the Middelburg
district in what was then the Transvaal province of South Africa) are based on the
mural paintings found in tribal huts. BMW explains that
[Mahlangu’s] transfer of tribal tradition to a modern idiom of high technology . . .
[was] natural, yet challenging. Conscious of the exalted company she was joining [i.e.,
other well-known contemporary artists] in being invited to add to the BMW Art Car
Collection, Esther Mahlangu is particularly proud of the fact she is the first woman
artist in the collection BMW Art Car Collection. (BMW Art Car Collection 1993, n.p.)
Figure 2.3. The BMW Pavilions fuse art exhibitions and product
promotion.
 Corporate Cultural Politics 47

Figure 2.4. BMW lifestyle as product merchandising.

Unlike Western consumer products that are adapted, decorated, or modified as they
merge and clash with indigenous cultures (e.g., taxis), Mahlangu’s commission, like
all the “Art Cars,” was clearly designed as a product for cultural export, that is, one
that could be employed as a promotional symbol of corporate global diversity and
“exclusively a work of art . . . [that] will never be driven on the road” (BMW Art Car
Collection 1993, n.p.). This exported culture is then sent around the world in a never-
ending tour of museums (the Louvre, Centre Pompidou, Whitney Museum of Ameri-
can Art, Palazzo Grassi, Cultural Center Hong Kong) and BMW galleries. The inter-
national exhibits and the iconic status of the BMW cars as prestige objects further
48 Corporate Cultural Politics

fuse physical and economic (upward) mobility with globalization: “And they will roll
on: to Toronto, Chicago, Pasadena and San Diego, to Johannesburg, Cape Town and
Pretoria, to Tokyo, London, Barcelona . . . an idea travels around the globe” (BMW
Art Car Collection 1993, n.p.).
Another dimension of corporate globalization facilitated by art is the widespread
development, beginning in the 1960s, of corporate art collections and galleries (e.g., at
the Hypo-Bank or Chase Manhattan Bank).29 Apart from their utilitarian function as
interior decoration for corporate buildings, art collections validate corporate partici-
pation in culture at the local or internal level. In addition to its economic value and
potential public-relations functions, corporate art is frequently cited as a factor in mo-
tivating employees.30 In fact, various forms of in-house cultural programming (e.g.,
artists in residence, lectures, concerts, employee workshops) are used to promote im-
proved employee relations and heighten productivity, in some cases through rewards
or incentive programs (e.g., VIP concert tickets, vacations). Cultural programs for
employees compose an internal dimension of corporate cultural politics, although
they perform different functions than sponsorship programs, which are directed ex-
ternally to target markets. Occasionally however, the two intersect, such as when
Volkswagen sponsored the Rolling Stones Voodoo Lounge tour and was able to bring
the band to the VW factory parking lot for a concert.
Bettina Becker’s analysis of Walter de Maria’s Five Continents sculpture (1989), lo-
cated in the main reception hall of the DaimlerChrysler (at that time Daimler-Benz)
headquarters in Stuttgart-Möhringen, draws our attention to the function of art with-
in corporate spaces by problematizing its reception among employees (1994, 131–40).
The sculpture is a 125-cubic-meter steel-framework cube, with Plexiglass sections
making up each of its six sides. The cube is filled with almost 250 tons of irregularly
cut, hand-size, white stones quarried in Kenya, Brasil, India, Greece, and the United
States. The marble and quartz crystals are reflected in the changing light of the atrium
and in the spotlights directed toward the sculpture. Becker summarizes the symbolic
function of the work in the context of Daimler-Benz’s corporate identity:
The stones which are joined at this location are a symbol for the unity of the earth, and
stand for the surmounting of spatial and temporal distances, for change, growth, and
transitory passages, as well as for the internationality of the corporation, in whose re-
ception hall they are located. (132)

Based on her study of employee interaction with the sculpture and informal inter-
views, Becker concludes that most employees have either become so accustomed to
the work that they disregard it, or they perceive it as an obstacle blocking traffic pat-
terns within the main entryway. By virtue of its size and central placement in the re-
ception hall, however, they do use it as a meeting point near the company restaurant
(135–37). Many employees have a decidedly negative reaction to the artwork, which
they have nicknamed “the rock pile next to the fly” (referring to a large fly that was
entombed in the layered rocks during the work’s composition); others call it “the cat-
 Corporate Cultural Politics 49

litter box” (Katzenklo) (136–37). Becker interprets the employees’ reception of Five
Continents as (1) a reflection of a common disinterest in contemporary art among
many members of society and their inability to “read the code” of contemporary art,
and (2) the failure of many corporations (in this case Daimler) to provide sufficient
infrastructure in mediating the significance and interpretation of art and specific art-
works within the context of the headquarters building (137–38). An important conclu-
sion of Becker’s analysis is that the actual reception of corporate art within the work-
place is not only differentiated but frequently very negative—a fact that is often
suppressed because top-level executives are personally involved in the acquisition of
major works of corporate art (183).
At other firms (e.g., Degussa AG or the Deutsche Bank), managers who perceived
that art and “good taste” were being forced upon them sometimes responded by turn-
ing pictures over, by altering (but not destroying) a work using slips of paper, by sur-
rounding it with cola cans (i.e., surrounding that which is perceived as esoteric with
the banal and everyday), or by refusing to occupy the work space (Bettina Becker 1994,
67–68; Nicolaus 1990, 90–91).31 Becker refers to corporate art as “a subversive secret
weapon” (1994, 67, 174) because controversial works open the door to unexpected em-
ployee responses, which are actually directed to management. Certainly, the fact that
employees feel strongly enough about a work of art to alter or remove it confirms its
potential as a provocation in contexts where its function is frequently relativized or
reduced to decoration. The artificial construct of the cultivated manager as artist-
entrepreneur obviously collapses in the face of the everyday reality of the workplace.
I would also argue that what differentiates art in the workplace from art in public
venues is that employees are, for the most part, confronted with the same works on a
daily basis, whereas museum visits are voluntary and public art can be more readily
circumnavigated. Hostile reactions to art in the workplace (e.g., altering or even de-
facing works) are of course more symptomatic of employee-employer relations than
necessarily of an underlying resentment of the artwork itself. Subversive responses to
corporate art are neither widespread, nor do they necessarily indicate organized social
resistance to corporate power. To a limited extent, they represent mediated expressions
of resistance, not against art per se but against the power structures within the corpo-
ration that impose it:32
Only in the highest floors of the corporate towers is art safe from tangible critique.
Here, the chairman resides and confers. Here, the watchmen are patrolling through the
reserved elegance of the rooms, with pistols respectfully concealed under their jackets.
Here, in the security area, the Deutsche Bank presents the rare essence of its collection:
works of classical modernism on white-enameled wood walls. (Nicolaus 1990, 90, cited
in Bettina Becker, 1994, 69)

At Daimler-Benz, corporate art functioned as a status symbol for the former CEO
Edzard Reuter, who, with Hans J. Baumgart, acquired and commissioned works with
little regard for the interests or knowledge of the employees (Bettina Becker 1994,
50 Corporate Cultural Politics

139–40). What is important here is not what Becker calls “the failure to read the code”
or individual interpretations of art but management’s unwillingness to engage em-
ployees in a substantive dialogue regarding the functions of art and culture both with-
in and outside of the workplace, rather than superimposing their own interests. Peda-
gogical programs (conversations with artists, lectures), when they are unilaterally
imposed on employees, may simply reinforce their perception that management con-
siders them cultural philistines. Moreover, the “alibi function of corporate art” (B.Becker
1994, 183) masks one of the most significant features of corporate cultural politics: the
corporation’s unwillingness or inability to critically interrogate its own participation
in the construction and representation of culture, for example, in terms of the social
functions of the products and images it produces.
The work of artists Michael Clegg and Martin Guttmann represents a step in this
direction. Their project for the DG Bank (Frankfurt), Museum for the Workplace
(1995), involved a two-stage process designed to engage employees in a reconsideration
of (1) their positions within the corporation, (2) the relations between employees and
corporate art collections, and (3) the manner in which employees interact within the
broader spaces and contexts of corporate communication (Sabau 1998, 7–9; Friede
1998, 11–17). In the first stage of their project, the artists asked DG Bank employees to
contribute art objects (in the broadest sense of the term) from their possessions, objects
that held some personal significance and that they would like to see in the workplace.
These loaned objects—from childhood drawings, T-shirts, and posters to paintings
and sculptures—were then “installed” in the employees’ respective departments in the
bank building and subsequently photographed in these new contexts by Clegg and
Guttmann. In the second stage, the photographic prints were enlarged to life-size
photos of the objects, framed, and hung in hallways and foyers of the building (Friede
1998, 14). Employees were then asked to record their reactions to the installations and
to the process in general.
Clegg and Guttmann wanted employees to reconsider the boundaries between
their private lives and their identities as bank employees in terms of the potential for a
“utopian workplace” in which the “institutionalized division of personality” would no
longer be necessary (Friede 1998, 16). The project privileges the role of the workers not
as observers or audiences for corporate art collections but rather as participants in con-
structing environments that contribute to an understanding of their own interaction
with the corporation. In his analysis of Museum for the Workplace, Michael Lingner de-
scribes the artists’ work with diverse communities and publics, such as the DG Bank
employees, as the creation of interactive situations, or “Soziotopes” (1998, 86). Al-
though the selection process initially privileges the relations between the objects and
the employee—as acts of personal selection and reflection—Clegg and Guttmann do
not allow the objects to function solely as “egocentric images of self-determination”
(Lingner 1998, 87) that art offers as symbols of autonomy. Rather, the photographic
mediation of personal objects, their subsequent representation as parts of an installa-
tion, and their recontextualization within the workplace intentionally destabilizes
 Corporate Cultural Politics 51

their aura and autonomy as personal possessions. Clegg and Guttmann are interested
in placing objects and acts within a communicative context, that is, the nexus of ex-
pressing individual identity and corporate identity. The construction of culture in the
workplace presents possibilities for exploring “forms of communication and forms
of communal decision-making . . . which can also be applied to other areas” (Lingner
1998, 87).
Employee reactions to the project itself were ambivalent. The majority of those
who participated in it approved of the collaborative or cooperative nature of the first
phase, during which they selected objects, assisted the artists in assembling them, and
made suggestions on the manner in which they should be installed and subsequently
displayed. However, Clegg and Guttmann’s realization of the project (the aesthetics of
the portraits of the objects and the contexts of their exhibition in the bank) were a
provocation for many workers (Sabau 1998, 70). Some commented that the personal
objects seemed depersonalized and displaced as a result of the installation. Employees
were particularly struck by their coworkers’ willingness to share personal objects (e.g.,
a child’s shoe) in the context of the workplace. Precisely this displacement of private
objects into corporate space made many employees aware of the extent to which they
wanted to protect their own private sphere as a separate space, while others became
aware of the extent to which their private and corporate identities had become inter-
twined. The installations indicated the possibilities for employees to participate in the
actual process of cultural production and the design of corporate spaces while simul-
taneously evoking considerable reflection on the relations among the bank, its corpo-
rate identity, and the employees’ own identity (individually and collectively) within
the corporate context.
Even seemingly minor ruptures in the facade of corporate culture from within re-
mind us that ultimately the myth of consensus or the notion of employee identification
with a corporate image is a highly unstable one, particularly in light of corporate down-
sizing. Daimler-Benz’s merger with Chrysler Corporation (into DaimlerChrysler), for
example, focused even greater attention on new transnational corporations (Hannerz
1996) as potent economic, political, and cultural entities without any long-term com-
mitment to regions, nations, or social entities—a fact that was largely overlooked with
respect to the economic interests of the pre-transnational corporation. Ralf Dahren-
dorf sees one of the problems of globalization as the preeminence of securing a com-
petitive lead at the expense of solidarity and social integration.33 Yet the more the cor-
poration abandons the regional or national allegiances that implicitly define its image,
the more it must insert itself in local communities, spaces, and politics in order to
maintain its legitimacy.

Hans Haacke: Deconstructing Cultural Politics and National Identity

Berlin exemplifies just such a space within the context of postunification Germany—
one that represents the intersection of corporate and national identities. This conver-
gence formed the thematic focus of many of Hans Haacke’s installations during the
52 Corporate Cultural Politics

1990s: Freedom Is Now Simply Going To Be Sponsored—out of Petty Cash (Die Freiheit
wird jetzt einfach gesponsort—aus der Portokasse) (1990) near Potsdamer Platz in Berlin;
Raise the Flag (Die Fahne hoch!) (1991) at Munich’s Königsplatz; Germania (1993)
in the German Pavilion at the Venice Biennale; Cast Concrete (1997) in the exhibition
Deutschlandbilder in the Martin-Gropius-Bau in Berlin; Corporate Culture (Standort-
kultur) (1997) at the documenta x in Kassel.34 Haacke’s work not only exposes the
paradoxes and political interests within German and U.S. cultural politics, it also ad-
dresses the globalization of corporate cultural politics within distinctly regional con-
texts by revealing the links between local, site-specific practices, modes of representa-
tion, and the transnational interests of the corporation. More than referencing or
analyzing these conflicts, Haacke actually inserts his work into the context of corpo-
rate and national politics by occupying ideologically charged spaces, from monu-
ments in Graz and Munich to outdoor advertising at the documenta x in Kassel. As
such, the installations attempt to engage audiences in a dialogue regarding the histori-
cal and ideological role of these public and privatized spaces by problematizing indi-
vidual and collective relations to the past and present. In this regard, Benjamin Buchloh
has observed that Haacke’s work performs both archaeological and mnemonic func-
tions (1997, 414). In addition, Haacke’s opposition to corporate sponsorship and its
thematization in his work questions the potential for nonsponsored art within a global
art market dominated by the institutional interests he challenges.
For those familiar with Haacke’s controversial career, including his banning from
the Guggenheim in 1971,35 his work may seem to have been relegated to the margins
of a radical aesthetic practice that Douglas Crimp compares to works by artists such
as Daniel Buren, Michael Asher, Robert Smithson, or Richard Serra:
Their contributions to a materialist critique of art, their resistance to the “disintegra-
tion of culture into commodities” [Walter Benjamin], were fragmentary and provision-
al, the consequences limited, systematically opposed or mystified, ultimately over-
turned. What remains of this critique today are a history to be recovered and fitful,
marginalized practices that struggle to exist at all in an art world more dedicated than
ever before to commodity value. (Crimp 1993, 155–56)

However, I would suggest that Haacke’s installations have a heightened significance

within the context of the public debates on cultural politics and on public policy with
respect to corporate products such as tobacco, which I have outlined in chapter 1.
Clearly, the debate over cultural politics has been precipitated both by a reproblemati-
zation of national representation in postunification Germany and by the privatization
of public services and of some cultural programming. In addition, the ongoing refor-
mulation of a cultural politics of national representation must be considered within
the contexts of postunification debates over the new capital in Berlin, Christo and
Jeanne-Claude’s Wrapped Reichstag project, the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin (de-
signed by Peter Eisenman), or Haacke’s work Der Bevölkerung (2000) for the newly
renovated Reichstag (designed by Norman Foster). Indeed, the heightened signifi-
 Corporate Cultural Politics 53

cance of culture within postunification German politics is underscored by the fact

that all three of these projects were only approved after lengthy debates in the German
Bundestag.
Haacke critically engages the forms of national and corporate representation in-
scribed in the actual sites. Simply put, his work is part of the site, and the site is part of
his work. For example, the installation Freedom Is Now Simply Going To Be Sponsored—
out of Petty Cash explores the shifts in political and economic power in postunification
Germany (Bourdieu and Haacke 1995, 92–95; Grasskamp 1995, 152). Haacke placed
the Mercedes star logo (a familiar fixture atop Berlin’s Europa Center) on top of a
guard tower near the former “Death Strip” at the Berlin Wall at Potsdamer Platz. On
opposite sides of the tower, he mounted quotations from Daimler-Benz and Mercedes
advertisements that had appeared in Der Spiegel and the New York Times. The first was
a variation on a line from Shakespeare’s Hamlet: “Bereit sein ist alles” (“The readiness is
all”). The second was from Goethe: “Kunst bleibt Kunst” (“Art will always remain art”).
A portion of this property was purchased by Daimler-Benz in a sweetheart deal with
the Berlin Senate, for about a tenth of its market value, before the plans for the area
were fully developed. However, after a complaint was filed with the EU, Daimler was
required to tender additional payments for the property (Bourdieu and Haacke 1995,
92–93). In anticipation of its office and entertainment complex (including a complex
housing a casino, the Grand Hotel, a musical theater, and a 3D-big-screen movie thea-
ter), Daimler-Benz produced a “3D-Video-Visualization” and interactive portrayals of
the architectural models at the Potsdamer Platz “Info Box” (an elevated information
center) in Berlin and through its Web site (Info Box: Der Katlog 1996, 109–44).
Crimp referred to the aesthetic strategies utilized by Haacke as “radicalized site
specificity” (1993, 155–56). Haacke appropriates the symbols of corporate image (the
Mercedes star, or a larger-than-life-size package of “Helmsboro” cigarettes bearing
U.S. Senator Jesse Helms’s photo) to problematize the relations between corporate
and national identities and to destabilize their representation. Initially, the spectator
approaches the urban site of the installation (e.g., a public place or monument) dur-
ing a daily routine (e.g., walking to work) or as a regularized part of urban activity
(e.g., shopping, visits to museums, restaurants). Now, however, the spectator is con-
fronted with a dramatic modification of the structure (or monument) or space.
For his installation Raise the Flag at the ceremonial gate (the Propyläen) at the
Königsplatz in Munich (site of many Nazi rallies), Haacke hung two large banners,
one with the names of German corporations and their subsidiaries that had supplied
Saddam Hussein prior to the Gulf War, the other, with a death’s head on it, reading,
“Roll Call: German Industry in Iraq” (Bourdieu and Haacke 1995, 21–28). Haacke’s
visual and symbolic modification of the gate and its impact on the surrounding square
presents a provocation and de-familiarization of the structure or object and its space,
which induces the spectator to react to its inherent contradictions. In this case, Haacke
unearths the political fragments of the Königsplatz’s historical legacy under National
Socialism and links them to the contemporary practices of Germany’s manufacturing
Figure 2.5. Hans Haacke, Die Freiheit wird jetzt einfach gesponsert—aus der Portokasse (Freedom Is Now Simply Going
To Be Sponsored—out of Petty Cash), 1990. Installation, Berlin. Photograph by Peter Zellien. Copyright 2001 Artists
Rights Society (ARS), New York/VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn.
Figure 2.6. The power of symbols: the Mercedes star.
56 Corporate Cultural Politics

industries—a history that is concealed by the square’s present-day function as a site for
tourist visits to two well-known museums of antiquity (the Glyptothek and the
Antikensammlung) that contextualize the Königsplatz as site of consumption of high
culture.
Walter Grasskamp has referred to Haacke’s modifications of public sites or objects
of mass consumption—such as the Berlin guard towers now topped with the Mercedes
star and advertising texts or his “Helmsboro” cigarette box—as “subversive imitation”
(1995, 144). Certainly, Haacke’s appropriation of the familiar, his use of copies or
counterfeits, should also be considered in terms of a postmodern project, to the extent
that the installations appropriate widely recognized symbols as media to “de-doxify”
(Hutcheon 1991, 7) or destabilize institutionalized representations of the symbol itself
(e.g., the Mercedes star or the Marlboro package). This is the subversive character of
the project, which intersects with what Linda Hutcheon has termed a critical “post-
modernism of complicity and critique that at once inscribes and subverts the conven-
tions and ideologies of the dominant cultural and social forces”(1991, 11).
Another installation, Germania, assumed a pivotal position in the representation
of German culture as a part of the German Pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 1993.
Grasskamp has analyzed Haacke’s response to this site by tracing the historical function
of the building as a metaphorical stage for national representation (1995, 136–37).36
Originally constructed as the Bavarian Pavilion in 1909, the structure became the
German National Pavilion in 1912. Under National Socialism, it regained its promi-
nence as an instrument of cultural politics after Adolf Hitler’s visit to the 1934

Figure 2.7. Hans Haacke, Die Fahne Hoch! (Raise the Flag!), 1991 (partial view). Installation, Munich. Photograph by
Hans Haacke. Copyright 2001 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn. Banner reads, “Roll Call:
German Industry in Iraq.”
 Corporate Cultural Politics 57

Biennale and the pavilion’s subsequent remodeling in 1938. After World War II and
during the Cold War, the exhibitions displayed a sort of depoliticized “national art”
(Grasskamp 1995, 140–41).
In 1993, however, Germania reproblematized the intersection of art, politics, and
national identity in postunification Germany. Haacke’s installation specifically re-
ferred to the historical context of the pavilion as a site of national representation under
National Socialism through a photograph of Hitler’s visit in 1934. A huge replica of a
one-mark piece minted in the reunified Germany of 1990 mounted over the entryway,
framing the photograph, underscored the metaphorical and visual banality of the
“DM über alles” (“The German mark over everything”). The word “Germania,” chis-
eled into the exterior of the pavilion, is repeated in the rotunda. The viewer could not
enter, however, for the floor was a “rubble field,” or Trümmerfeld (Grasskamp 1995), of
broken and fragmented concrete and plaster, signifying both the historical terrain of
fragmentation and discontinuity and the ongoing archaeology of remembering and
forgetting. By placing the postunification one-mark piece precisely where the eagle
and swastika once hung, Haacke seized upon the economic, political, and cultural
functions of the historical pavilion and reformulated them in terms of the new cultur-
al politics of “corporate identity” (Grasskamp 1995, 152).
By juxtapositioning the historical function of the building with the economic
function of cultural politics, Haacke accentuates a linkage that, as Grasskamp ob-
serves, does not want to be recognized but nonetheless cannot be denied (1995, 152).
Haacke challenges the spectator to examine the process of cultural production (be-
yond the contemplation of museal objects) and to participate in diverse forms of re-
membering. Many of his works address those spaces (physical and historical) that are
not apparently occupied by corporate or public programming, asking the spectator
not only to interrogate and explore the differences between public and privatized
spaces but also to recognize where they intersect and converge. Germania reproblema-
tizes both the representation of cultural and national identities and the social relations
to which they refer. In doing so, it engages the spectator in the context of cultural pro-
duction as a contested site.
Indeed, the linkages and dissonances of cultural politics and corporate identity
were manifest in the cultural politics of a postunification Germany defined as “Cor-
porate Germany” (Unternehmen Deutschland) by former Foreign Minister Klaus
Kinkel. They are exemplified in Berlin’s politics of space and illustrated by global cor-
porate investment and representation in the Potsdamer Platz projects, and also by the
merger of nonprofit, public, and commercial interests in cultural politics, for ex-
ample, in the new Deutsche Guggenheim Berlin (a satellite and joint-venture of the
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and the Deutsche Bank AG, initiated by the for-
mer U.S. ambassador to Germany) or in the film and media center housed in the Sony
Center (Info Box: Der Katalog 1996, 166–67). The cultural politics of German unifica-
tion also facilitated the reconfiguration and promotion of German identity in a more
positive, post–Cold War perspective by attempting to relegate National Socialism, the
58 Corporate Cultural Politics

Holocaust, and forty years of national division to a more distant past. As a signifier of
the new, global “Corporate Germany,” the opening of the Berlin Wall and reunifi-
cation provided a fertile field for global product and image promotion, such as the
Pepsi-Cola advertisement cited at the outset of this chapter. In a sense, these politics
of space and cultural politics, which marked the turbulence surrounding postunifica-
tion German identity during the 1990s while creating an aperture for its reassessment,
were realized and consolidated under the coalition government of Gerhard Schröder
and his minister of culture, Michael Naumann. Not only did Berlin become a site of
global corporate culture—simultaneously articulated as regional political and eco-
nomic interests (with respect to the EU and eastern Europe)—but it also performed
representational functions in the government’s attempt to resituate the image of
Germany’s past (in the Holocaust Memorial and the “new” Reichstag) as that of a na-
tion that had fully recognized its historical burden,37 and in doing so could now turn
to the future.
 Part II

Culture, Artists, Events

This page intentionally left blank
 3. Redefining Culture,
Absolutly

The rapid growth of sponsoring during the 1980s and 1990s was facilitated by an in-
creasing awareness of new definitions and uses of culture within the contexts of every-
day life. This process of redefining culture was in part driven by corporations them-
selves and mediated through advertising and promotion. Reconfigurations of everyday
culture and cultural identities (e.g., gender, ethnicity, or nationality) were shaped by
and circulated within media that produced, packaged, organized, and disseminated
culture for expanding global markets (e.g., cable and satellite television). This chap-
ter examines the articulation of corporate cultural politics within networks of cultur-
al production, representation, and dissemination. I will argue that these politics in-
creasingly fuse cultural representation with social agendas, not only to ensure and
validate legitimacy but also in order to insert corporate interests within local and global
contexts.
The cultural politics of the corporation, as mediated through cultural, social, or
ecological sponsorships, are more than just highly sophisticated corporate communi-
cations via advertising and public relations. The corporation’s sociopolitical interests
(e.g., in developing urban and regional spaces) cannot be adequately captured strictly
in terms of the expansion and colonizing tendencies of advertising and public rela-
tions.1 Rather than an end, advertising is a means to constructing social relations and
spaces that are based on consumption. More importantly, I have argued, corporate
cultural politics and the strategies of sponsoring (which are coordinated with but not
synonymous with advertising and promotion) are a response to dynamic social forces
challenging corporate politics both internally and externally. Sponsored culture, to be
effective, must operate on the boundaries between those spaces it dominates and new
spaces that are undefined or have yet to be defined in terms of resistance.
Yet corporate attempts to appropriate these spaces result in paradoxes and ruptures
that potentially expose and destabilize these interests. Such dissonances range from
the microlevel of internal labor relations (e.g., employee rejection of corporate art) to
the macrolevel of political “damage control” in the public-policy sphere (e.g., the
Brent Spar affair in Germany)2 or with regard to legislation to limit cigarette and alco-
hol advertising in the United States. Other reactions are tentative, sporadic responses by

61
62 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

popular culture, reactions that alter corporate representation and image at the micro-
political level (Fiske 1989, 214–17) rather than targeting the legitimacy of the corpo-
ration as a social entity per se. Michel Roux, former head of Absolut Vodka’s distri-
bution in the United States, was outraged when he encountered an overweight,
middle-class man wearing an Absolut T-shirt in an airport, because the combination
ruined the chic, hip image Roux wanted to cultivate for the brand. As a result, Roux
immediately ordered the merchandising discontinued (Lubow 1994, 68).
Thus, corporate cultural politics exist within a spectrum bounded by notions of a
totalizing corporate hegemony on the one hand and organized resistance on the other.
Corporate cultural politics are actually self-reflexive in that they are predicated upon and
emanate from the corporation’s simultaneous anticipation and engagement of interactions
between both forces: that is, the corporation’s own attempts to assert its interests and, con-
versely, resistance to those attempts. Moreover, corporate cultural politics are not just an
attempt to control the interplay of these forces, although they are frequently that too.
They are a process of identifying, engaging, or orchestrating rather than simply elimi-
nating forces of resistance, as well as those actions that simply undermine or block
corporate interests. Finally, the articulation of corporate cultural politics only emerges
when we examine the specific contexts where cultural and social policies intersect or
occasionally clash.
Although sponsoring tends to be associated with high culture (Jordan and Weedon
1995, 55; Twitchell 1996, 19), a “top-down view” overlooks numerous forms of spon-
soring that address diverse audiences and expressions of culture, in particular event
culture (e.g., open-air concerts, street festivals, or sporting events), which I will exam-
ine in subsequent chapters. Nor does this perspective accurately reflect the actual uses
of culture among diverse social milieus, which no longer conceptualize such hierar-
chies in their own construction of culture, regardless of whether they are associated
with institutions of high culture (e.g., opera) or low culture (e.g., comic books).
While representations of high culture are still employed by sponsors to package and me-
diate notions of distinction, the actual production, mediation, and reception of high,
low, mass, or popular culture are infinitely more complex and mutable than these cate-
gories will allow.
Gerhard Schulze’s analysis of contemporary German society suggests a notion of
cultural orientations embedded within a “multi-dimensional space of everyday aes-
thetics,” which can no longer be conceptualized in terms of hierarchies between high
and low (1992, 269).3 Relegating sponsorships to the domain of high culture alone
underestimates the considerable influence of the corporation in the production and
representation of culture in everyday life, for example, with respect to our use of
media, travel, food, design, or architecture. Limiting the influence of corporate in-
volvement in culture to one domain also suggests a definition of culture that would
reject the notion that everyday uses of culture involve an ongoing process of individu-
al and collective redefinition and reconfiguration.
This chapter and chapters 4 and 5 examine specific examples of how artists and au-
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 63

diences participate in the reformulation of cultural representations and identities, ei-

ther through strategic alliances with institutionalized or sponsored culture (e.g., Annie
Leibovitz’s collaboration with American Express) or as forms of resistance to state and
corporate sponsorships (e.g., Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s Wrapped Reichstag ). These
studies show that although corporations occupy a pivotal position in framing and or-
ganizing the contexts within which culture is produced, disseminated, and received,
the actual contexts of reception are often contested sites. Collectively, the analyses
attempt to trace the manner in which corporate cultural and social programs (1) per-
form self-legitimizing functions, (2) trade on the currency of identity and diversity,
(3) provide platforms for collaborations with artists and institutions, or, conversely,
(4) are rejected by other artists and signal forms of resistance. Cultural boundaries are
also redrawn in terms of a politics of local and national identity. This chapter also in-
vestigates the relationship between corporate cultural politics and multicultural pro-
gramming as a process of representing and redefining local, national, or transnational
identities.

High and Low

The expansion of various forms of sponsoring not only reflects structural shifts within
the cultural marketplace, but it also represents changes in the definition, function, and
perception of culture by artists and audiences. In her article “What’s High, What’s
Low—and Who Cares?” Barbara Kruger writes,
[Art] can be defined as the ability, through visual, verbal, gestural and musical means,
to objectify one’s experience in the world: to show and tell, through a kind of eloquent
shorthand, how it feels to be alive. And of course a work of art can also be a potential
commodity, a vessel of financial speculation and exchange.
But doesn’t popular culture have the ability to do some of the same things; to en-
capsulate in a gesture, a laugh, a terrific melodic hook, a powerful narrative, the same
tenuously evocative moments, the same fugitive visions? (1990)

Kruger’s use of photography consciously problematizes the relations between repre-

sentation and reality by employing artistic strategies that interrogate and destabilize
the medium itself (photography), as well as its reproduction and exhibition, for ex-
ample, as advertisements, photojournalism, or art.
Corporate sponsors have simultaneously identified and promoted the expanded
uses of culture within the context of advertising and corporate communication. For
sponsors, differences between high and low are only relevant to the extent that they
correspond to target markets and the products or images directed toward those mar-
kets. Although sponsors certainly instrumentalize images of high art or popular cul-
ture when they wish to communicate with markets, they simultaneously espouse cul-
tural pluralism.
The representation of a pluralistic, cultural democracy as a central feature of cor-
porate politics was manifest in AT&T’s sponsorship of the exhibition High and Low:
64 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

Modern Art and Popular Culture (1990–91). The exhibition was organized by Kirk
Varnedoe (director of painting and sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art) and
Adam Gopnik (art critic for The New Yorker). High and Low subsequently toured in
Chicago and Los Angeles. An advertisement for the exhibition, titled “Expanding the
Language of Art,” legitimizes AT&T’s own participation in cultural production and
mediation by linking corporate communication, popular culture, and high culture:
Modern art has had an extraordinary openness to popular culture—to styles and im-
agery derived from newspapers, advertisements, comics, caricature and graffiti. AT&T
and The Museum of Modern Art present the first encompassing history of that century-
long dialogue between “high” and “low.” From Cubist collage and Surrealist fantasy to
Pop art and beyond, “HIGH and LOW: Modern Art and Popular Culture” eavesdrops
on the conversation between private imagination and public communication. As we at
AT&T celebrate 50 years of innovative associations with the arts, we can think of no
more fitting a collaboration than one that celebrates the associations between the arts.

Within the discursive logic of the advertising text, the conceptual linkage of commu-
nication among artists, audiences, and cultural expression (simplified to high and
low) is reformulated in terms of a process of creative communication between the
“arts” and the “corporation.” The graphic design of the advertisement reinforces the
image of the corporation as a cultural producer and partner in arts production.4 An
ampersand prominently links “High” and “Low” in the advertisement’s poster art and
forms an integral part of the corporation’s logo (AT&T, originally American Tele-
phone & Telegraph) in order to repeat this connection visually. Like most forms of
cultural sponsorship, the advertisement for the sponsored project also becomes the
medium for a promotional message, which in this instance appears prominently at the
bottom right of the ad: “AT&T The right choice.”
The use of the word “eavesdrop” by a multinational communications corporation
suggests an overt and artificial pose of self-irony designed to attract an urbane, sophis-
ticated audience to the exhibition. “Eavesdropping,” in its literal meaning of illicitly
listening to a private conversation, implicitly positions the exhibition’s visitor as a
voyeur rather than as a participant in the “dialogue.” However, “eavesdropping” is also
utilized to reposition culture in terms of a popular culture of equal-access consumer-
ism harking back to old-fashioned telephone party lines (in contradistinction to the
negative associations of wiretapping).5 By defining a dichotomy between private and
public spheres (“private imagination and public communication”) parallel to a di-
chotomy of artistic expression (high versus low), the promotional text validates the
apparent dissolution of these boundaries and thereby inserts its own participation as an
expression of social and cultural democratization.
The advertisement for High and Low applies the notion of “eavesdropping”—that
is, as an intervention in a communication not accessible to others—to the privileged
function of high art. Yet we learn that this communication is no longer privileged.
We are now permitted to participate in what was once an illicit act of overstepping
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 65

Figure 3.1. Sponsorships legitimize corporate participation in cultural production.

sociocultural boundaries. The advertisement celebrates the dissolution of cultural and

social difference by declaring the pluralism of everyday popular culture (“newspapers,
advertisements, comics, caricature and graffiti”), to which high culture is also indebt-
ed. We learn that the commodity “high culture” is indeed as accessible as the everyday
world of popular culture. For high culture is also reproducible, consumable, and
therefore democratic.
High and Low provided an opportunity and forum for AT&T to legitimize its own
66 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

role as a cultural producer by defusing the critical relations between art (as high cul-
ture) and advertising (as commercial or low culture). The exhibition received exten-
sive promotion (due to the AT&T sponsorship) and many reviews in the print media,
and it also became a point of departure for debates among art critics regarding popu-
lar culture.6 Arthur Danto suggested that much of the controversy concerning High
and Low was related to the exhibition’s emphasis on the relationship between art and
advertising (1993, 152–56).7 It is the deconstruction of this border that Danto believes
was controversial, not only because it legitimized the equality of high and low culture,
but also because it reversed that historical hierarchy (156).
Although Danto emphasized this inversion as the focus of the debate (rather than
the curatorial practices of the exhibition itself ), Douglas Crimp pointed out that nei-
ther the exhibition nor the catalog essays fully considered the problematic relation-
ship between art and commerce within a critical framework:
The premise of the exhibition was simple: artists sometimes transform aspects of popu-
lar and mass culture into high art, just as they transform “primitive” art into high
Western expression. High and Low was quite uniformly condemned in the press for its
simple-minded thesis and for its wholesale exclusion of contemporary practices that
break down the distinctions the museum so unthinkingly reiterated. . . . Varnedoe and
Gopnik summarily dismiss the entire range of serious thinking about their subject,
from Frankfurt School mass culture and aesthetic theory and the cultural studies initi-
ated during the 1960s at Birmingham to disparate contemporary feminist and post-
modernist analyses. (1993, 30–31n24)

AT&T’s sponsorship of High and Low illustrates both a promotional strategy and
a politics of representation used to fuse the corporation with contemporary culture.
The corporation’s own mediation of High and Low communicates an undifferentiat-
ed, reductive, and binary perspective of cultural history as elitist in order to replace it
with a new consumerist pluralism that ostensibly erases social boundaries.8 This is
accomplished by making “advertisements” synonymous with popular culture and
then thematizing the merger between high and low culture. Once the advertisement is
recognized as a legitimate form of cultural expression, the advertiser (as sponsor) is im-
plicitly introduced as a legitimate producer of culture.9
When sponsors deploy forms of cultural difference, such forms are frequently de-
coys to be dispersed immediately by substituting a cultural pluralism of consumption.
American Express, for example, employs both high and popular culture as forms of
socioeconomic distinction that can be erased through acquisition. Although Frank
Sinatra’s songs may not be associated with high culture, a special performance in
Germany for American Express cardholders was promoted as being exclusive and
prestigious.10 The Sinatra concert attains its exclusivity not through the inaccessibility
of an aesthetics of high culture requiring prior knowledge of cultural codes but
through the cost of participation. The fact that Sinatra’s recordings are available to a
mass market is irrelevant. The promotion and packaging of the concert was designed
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 67

to present it as a unique event with its own aura of exclusivity that could not be re-
peated through the mass-produced recordings. In this sense, the sponsor attempts to
recapture and recreate the aura of high art for its own patrons through socioeconomic
inclusion of its members or exclusion of nonmembers from the spaces in which such
events are sited.11
At the same time, forms of culture that have been associated with high art have
been promoted and marketed for mass audiences. American Express’s sponsorship of
the Rembrandt exhibition in Berlin, London, and Amsterdam is only one example of
the blockbuster art exhibitions organized by museums and corporations since the late
1970s partly to attract new audiences into museums but also to provide an economic
and cultural legitimation for museums and sponsors in the context of a cultural poli-
tics of pluralism (e.g., Hoffmann’s slogan “Kultur für alle” [“Culture for everyone”]) in
Germany, and diversity in the United States. Regardless of whether culture is branded
as high or low, it is reconfigured for target markets based on its promotional value. Ac-
cess is available to all who can pay the price. Indeed, the promotional strategies of
sponsors and arts institutions suggest that the representation of culture frequently su-
percedes the audience’s own participation in it; participation is reduced to consumption
rather than critical engagement. In other words, the promotional value of events or
cultural programs, or their economic success (for the cultural institution), has in many
cases become more important than their content, which becomes a form of packaging
for the event itself—a dimension I will examine more closely in chapter 5.

Mapping Multidimensional Culture: Theoretical Perspectives

Certainly, sponsors have already internalized and applied the realities of a multi-
dimensional culture and society, both in their cultural politics and market strategies.
Sociologist Gerhard Schulze observes that the aesthetics of everyday existence are
characterized by a de-verticalization (Entvertikalisierung) of social groups (1992, 167).
He rejects the dichotomy of mass culture on the one hand and the fragmentation or
particularization of social milieus—“where each individual acts as the inventor of
his/her own style” (405)—on the other:
Personal style always addresses a public. Because each public possesses a specialized
knowledge of its own style, no random individual can be counted as part of the group.
We can “dance at different weddings” for which there are in each case different aesthet-
ic practices characteristic of that social milieu. The relations of prestige which would
span social milieus become disparate and site-specific. Those who look beyond the
boundary of their own backyard, looking down on others, cannot expect that their
neighbors are looking back up at them. (405)

Schulze’s explication of de-verticalization is echoed in Scott Lash’s discussion of the

process of sociological de-differentiation (Entdifferenzierung) related to postmodern-
ism (Lash 1991, 5). The process of postmodernist de-differentiation occurs within all
spheres of cultural production, mediation, distribution, and reception. The autonomy
68 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

of cultural categories is destabilized and spheres of cultural practice collapse, overlap,

or merge. As Lash observes, this is particularly true of postmodernist modes of represen-
tation, which utilize images rather than words in the process of signification. In situat-
ing postmodernism with respect to modernism, Lash concludes that
postmodernism can pose a greater threat to social and cultural order than modernism
has done. This is, first, because postmodernism pervades both high and popular cul-
ture, while modernism has been confined to the realm of high culture. A further threat
concerns stabilization in cultural paradigms. If realism promises stability and order in
both representation and reality, then modernist autonomization and self-legislation
effectively destabilizes the representation. Postmodernist de-differentiation on the other
hand puts chaos, flimsiness, and instability in our experience of reality itself. (1991,
14–15)

In their analyses of de-verticalization and de-differentiation, Schulze and Lash

underscore both a process of sociological reorientation (with respect to how milieus
use culture in constructing identity and difference) and the representation of culture
(in terms of Lash’s “regime of signification”). Like Schulze and Lash, Andrew Wernick
identifies a shift in the representation and construction of culture in terms of the rela-
tions between material and the symbolic economies:
In trying to locate the place of promotion on the sociological map . . . the very distinc-
tion between the symbolic and material economies, between the regime of accumula-
tion and the regime of signification, cannot be clearly drawn. And for good reason. Pro-
motional practice is generated exactly on the boundary, a locus which implies the
dissolution of the boundary itself. (1991, 185)

However, Schulze argues that this intersection of the material and symbolic con-
sumption is determined by a complex interaction between the physical and psycho-
logical, an interaction that defines culture as a process of both material and symbolic
production, mediation, and consumption. Although it is the representation and con-
sumption of images that increasingly characterizes the organization of social relations,
Schulze reminds us that the actual process of “experiencing the image” involves a
combination, or fusion, of both cognitive and physical elements, whereby perceiving
the object and actually experiencing it (sensually or emotionally) are two separate, al-
beit related, processes. The objective “facts” (e.g., the information on a wine label)
must first be “translated into the individual’s own subjective system of signs, before
s/he can react aesthetically” (Schulze 1992, 97). This sensory perception can be con-
ceptualized as meaning, which is simultaneously coded with a specific cognitive per-
ception, or awareness, and is modified by new (or renewed) perceptions (97).
With respect to the aesthetics of everyday life, “there can be no clear division be-
tween physical and mental modalities” (Schulze 1992, 107). Experiencing the “every-
day” (e.g., eating an ice-cream cone, lying in the sun, drinking the day’s first cup of
coffee, or making love) are only truly interpreted as pleasurable experiences when they
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 69

are cognitively linked with memories, fantasies, expectations, or interpretations. The

sensory attributes of a specific situation (color, sound, movement, taste, smell) form
the “raw material” that the individual combines with cognitive meanings in order to
construct an aesthetic experience (Schulze 1992, 107). The construction of meaning
based on the interaction between the physical and the psychological, or the sensory
and the cognitive, reinserts the significance of reception, or more specifically, of audi-
ence and the contexts of reception, into the discussion of culture.
Audience positions (individually and collectively) are a critical component in the
construction of image, identity, and experience as social space. Although the title of
Barbara Kruger’s essay “What’s High, What’s Low—and Who Cares?” addresses post-
modern de-differentiation, it also focuses attention on “who” receives and defines cul-
ture. Kruger explores both the indeterminacy of representation (e.g., in photography)
and the contingency of audience positions in terms of these social and gender rela-
tions. Rosalyn Deutsche situates these projects within a feminist aesthetics of represen-
tations, an aesthetics that challenges the spaces and relationships between viewers and
cultural production:
Built into the architecture of modernist looking is an injunction to recognize images
and viewers as given, rather than produced, spaces and therefore as interiors closed in
on themselves. But art informed by feminist ideas about representation disrupts this
closure by staging vision as a process that mutually constitutes image and viewer. . . .
By exposing the repressed relationships through which vision produces the sense of
autonomy—by . . . exploring the viewer’s noncontinuity with itself—this work also
disturbs the sense that otherness is purely external. (1998, 302–3)

Feminist aesthetic practices underscore the fact that a multidimensional rather

than hierarchical conceptualization of culture does not dissolve or erase differences
with respect to gender, sexual, ethnic, or regional identities. Rather, they question and
destabilize the social relations of power that constitute these spaces. Corporate cultur-
al politics responds to this challenge by reconfiguring, organizing, and structuring
identity and diversity as markets defined by consumption.
The use of photography and film in the work of feminist artists also points to the
power of visual culture. The most evident expression of the interplay between the
construction of cultural identities as commodities and the need to reinvent them con-
stantly (as a result of shifts in social milieus) lies within the mass media, or what
Douglas Kellner has termed media culture (1995, 16–17). It is not only the multi-
dimensional character of culture but also its production, dissemination, and reception
in multimedia formats that indicate the primacy of the image and the aesthetics of vi-
sualization as key components in defining social relations. Although Kellner argues
that media culture “must be differentially interpreted and contextualized within the
matrix of the competing social discourses and forces which constitute it,” he also
identifies it as “the dominant culture today” in terms of its role in socialization (e.g.,
in families, schools, churches) and projection of images (17).
70 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

The institutional, social (i.e., milieu-specific), and communicative functions of

media culture identified by Kellner are related to Wernick’s concept of promotional
culture. Wernick investigates how forms of promotional discourse are linked with
those that have been historically perceived as nonpromotional (e.g., the discourse of
politics or at universities). He notes that “the range of cultural phenomena which . . .
serve to communicate a promotional message has become today, virtually co-extensive
with our produced symbolic world.”12 Through common siting and the appropriation
(or assimilation) of similar modes of signification and rhetoric, Wernick argues, promo-
tion has become the dominant mode of individual and institutional representation—
from the manner in which individuals promote and package themselves as entities
(e.g., in order to secure career advancement) to the marketing programs of nonprofit
institutions (e.g., education, arts) designed to validate their social legitimacy and
maintain economic stability.
The integration of promotional rhetoric and strategies of signification into diverse
spheres of social activity has been accelerated and facilitated through the proliferation
of visual images in the mass media and their increasing use as a predominant mode of
communication. Corporate interests have unquestionably played a primary role in de-
termining how cultural products and symbols are produced, circulated, and received.
Nonetheless, this process has also been a result of resistance or subversion of the domi-
nant images of symbolic expression (e.g., Warhol’s use of advertising in art), which in
turn evoke new forms of appropriation. As Wernick points out, promotional culture
exists on the boundary between the symbolic and the material, a boundary that fre-
quently cannot be discerned. I would argue that the cultural politics of the corpora-
tion increasingly require it to explore, occupy, and redefine social boundaries in order
to maintain economic, political, and social legitimacy.
Wernick’s analysis of advertising within promotional culture traces the erasure of
boundaries between advertising, entertainment, and politics. Indeed, promotional
culture is particularly useful for my discussion of sponsorship. Certainly, the notion of
image transfer, which forms the conceptual centerpiece of most sponsorships, rein-
forces the idea of material and symbolic exchange among corporations, institutions,
and audiences. However, it is a notion that extends beyond the immediate sites of
consumption into the sphere of social interaction and production of culture.

Absolutly Warhol: Reconstituting the Myth of Patronage

The expansion of Sweden’s Absolut Vodka brand in the United States (distilled by
V&S Vin & Sprit, or simply V&S), under the direction of Michel Roux (CEO of
Carillon Importers), became a paradigm for the re-signification of the sponsor as pa-
tron and illustrates the interests of corporate cultural politics in structuring social rela-
tions as consumption. By fusing arts patronage, advertising, and lifestyle promotion,
Roux was able to make Absolut Vodka the leading imported vodka sold in the United
States during the late 1980s and early 1990s (Brown 1991, 128; Tilsner 1994, 95). How-
ever, the idea of using contemporary artists and their artwork for the Absolut advertise-
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 71

ments was suggested by the artist-entrepreneur Andy Warhol in 1985. Warhol received
$65,000 for his painting of an Absolut bottle (a price Roux refused to exceed for other
artists’ work in the future) and sold reproduction rights for five years (Brown 1991, 129;
Lewis 1996, 65–67; Lubow 1994, 68). Despite initial skepticism from Carillon’s TBWA
advertising agency, Warhol’s Absolut Vodka ads were enormously successful, even in
venues beyond the upscale art magazines in which they were initially placed (Lewis
1996, 66). Warhol recommended other contemporary artists—Keith Haring, Ed
Ruscha, and Armand Arman—who could continue the visual style he had established
(Brown 1991, 129). The subsequent series of Absolut advertisements defined a visual
aesthetic through the repetition of the Absolut Vodka bottle in various configurations
and became a part of what TBWA executive Paul Donaher referred to as “owning a vi-
sual style”(quoted in Lubow 1994, 78).13
The success of this visual aesthetic relied on maximal repetition and variation. The
serialization of the Absolut Vodka bottle, as an icon for contemporary art, was com-
bined with the variation of its artistic representation in order to produce a visual trade-
mark style.14 Each artist inscribed the advertisement with a fusion of Absolut’s image
and his or her own artistic style in order to project it as a unique visual statement. This
tension between the commodified repetition of the bottle and the artists’ attempts to
endow it with its own aura, but bearing their own visual trademark, was a critical fac-
tor in the success of the Absolut advertisements. Indeed, the interplay of repetition and
variation is a key feature of seemingly disparate forms of mass-produced culture (e.g.,
special-edition automobiles, such as VW’s Rolling Stones edition, or best-sellers).15
Clearly, one of the strategies of sponsors has been to engage artists in the process
of cultural production in a systematic or regularized fashion. Whereas Warhol (and
other leading artists) may have been able to approach this process with a degree of
economic leverage, trading on his image as a cultural commodity, lesser-known artists
utilized the commissions for Absolut in order to establish their own presence within
the art market. In this sense, the Absolut advertisements were a collaboration that al-
lowed all the participants (sponsors and artists) to increase their economic and pro-
motional capital. Michel Roux required a steady source of artistic talent in order to
generate a significant number of Absolut advertisements. For artists, the promotional
value of the advertisements, which appeared in upscale media (e.g., The New Yorker,
the New York Times, Art & Antiques), could be transformed into market value. For
lesser-known “starving artists,” like John Pacovsky, an Absolut advertisement provided
media exposure in a notoriously competitive arts market. Before Pacovsky’s work was
featured in a special forty-page advertising insert (“Absolut Artists of the 90s”) in
Art & Antiques magazine, he had been painting commercial buildings in Wilkes-
Barre, Pennsylvania. After Roux commissioned two paintings (for $5,000 each) for
Absolut advertisements, Pacovsky’s sales increased dramatically. As a result of Absolut
ads, recognized artists, such as Romero Britto, were able to double both the asking price
of paintings (from $5,000–$25,000 to $9,000–$40,000) and their volume of sales
(Brown 1991, 128–29).16
72 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

Roux’s personal involvement in commissioning an ever-expanding group of artists

for the Absolut series was also designed to communicate the image of Absolut (and
Roux) as patrons of the arts:
Instead of being merely a liquor salesman, he was now a patron of the arts. The trans-
formation was crucial, for the man and for the brand. For Roux, the whole world could
be subsumed under the Absolut label, and he began commissioning Absolut fashions
and Absolut concerts along with Absolut artwork. Absolut, already an advertising icon,
became a cultural icon as well. (Lubow 1994, 68–69)

Richard Lewis (Absolut account manager with TBWA) remarked that Roux “took enor-
mous pleasure in his role as the Medici of Teaneck” (Lewis 1996, 67). The vocabulary
and imagery of patronage is replicated in the marketing trade journals. Sales and
Marketing Management’s annual Marketing Achievement Award for 1992 described
Absolut Vodka as “a product that . . . embraces the same commitment to quality,
artistry, and charity that families like the De Medicis, the D’Estes, and the Guggen-
heims became known for during their respective reigns” (“Carillon Importers” 1992,
44). However, Roux departs from traditional notions of patronage when he acknowl-
edges that he is not the actual collector. The artworks are owned exclusively by the cor-
poration (Vin & Sprit), and the artworks “are not an investment. . . . They’re advertis-
ing” (quoted in Brown 1991, 129).
In this context, the reintroduction of the notion of patronage also corresponds to
my discussion of the historical development of corporate identity and corporate cul-
tural politics during the 1980s, that is, what Hans Haacke and Stefan Römer identi-
fied as attempts to reinstate the “aura of the artist” and link it to the creative entrepre-
neur (Römer 1992, 64). Walter Grasskamp argues that the contemporary use of
patronage is based on the nineteenth-century bourgeoisie’s own idealized notion of
the patron, which it projected upon earlier epochs in order to legitimize its own inter-
ests. The clerical, feudal uses of commissioned art were later rewritten as selfless pa-
tronage. Historical distinctions among those who functioned primarily in promoting
the arts, those who collected, and those who endowed the arts (with capital or proper-
ty) were conflated and fused into the image of the patron (Grasskamp 1992, 82–83).
The fiction of the selfless patron became a medium for the legitimation of corpo-
rate cultural politics (Grasskamp 1992, 82), which could be recycled in diverse contexts.
Roux’s own appropriation of the vocabulary and posture of patronage, promotionally
disseminated in business and professional magazines (e.g., Forbes and Sales and Mar-
keting Management ), provided a “package” for the promotion and exchange of the
product. However, the representation of the Absolut campaign as patronage exposes
the dissonances of corporate cultural politics, in this case, the contradictions between
a “sponsoring philosophy” of patronage and the sponsoring practice of symbolic and
material exchange. Thus, culture is signified and dually encoded as auratic, transcen-
dent, or distinctive while it is also instrumentalized as a serialized, reproducible com-
modity. The fusion of “art” with “marketing” in the language and representational
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 73

politics of corporate sponsors such as Carillon (consider their slogan “Marketing after
all, is an art of its own”) or Philip Morris (“It takes Art to make a Company great”)
facilitates an apparent dissolution of the cultural hierarchies that historical patronage
supported and replaces them with the projection of a consumer-oriented, pluralistic,
culture of distinction. Finally, the vocabulary of corporate patronage performs a self-
legitimizing function by inverting and merging the uses and meanings of art and mar-
ket (e.g., “the art of marketing”). This process positions the corporate sponsor within
the cultural marketplace as (1) an artist (entrepreneurship becomes synonymous with
creativity), (2) a patron (a venture capitalist in cultural investments), (3) an art dealer
(a broker or mediator of cultural programs), (4) a collector (consumer or investor), and
(5) an audience/consumer (the corporation claims to be part of local communities
and promotes its interests as being consonant with the community’s own).
Roux’s commissions (paintings, sculpture, glasswork, jewelry, furniture, cartoons,
fashions, symphonic music, ballets) and promotions (e.g., for the Museum of Ameri-
can Folk Art or the Museum of Native American Art) project the image of the spon-
sor who embraces the notion of pluralistic, diverse cultures—not an image based on
sociocultural hierarchies of high versus low (“Carillon Importers” 1992, 44). Yet spon-
soring’s appropriation and multiplication of cultural production divorces culture
from the construction of marginalized cultural and social identities by defining the re-
lations between cultural production and audiences in terms of subcultures of con-
sumption. Despite a representational politics of cultural diversity, Roux returns to the
vocabulary of patronage and cultural distinction in order to reinscribe the artwork
and the product (Absolut Vodka) with the transcendence of a “classic”: “Years from
now, there will be people listening to a piece of music commissioned by our product.
And that will be the legacy of the product—something that lasts. Something that can
be enjoyed again and again. Like Absolut, of course” (quoted in “Carillon Importers”
1992, 44).
Sponsoring’s image transfer is complete. Art, defined as the “Good, True, and
Beautiful” (Bourdieu and Haacke 1995, 143–44), is bestowed upon the commissioned
works of art and Absolut Vodka as they become one. Grasskamp concludes that the
patron’s privileged social status as a cultural arbiter is created through an illusion, or
magic ritual of sorts: The patron selects works of art from the marketplace and then
transforms them back into the aesthetic ideal that the artist supposedly produced (and
the market eradicated) (1992, 83). Historically, the patron has maintained social legiti-
macy by ameliorating and compensating for the market’s influence on art. Yet the
market forces that lead to the commodification of the artwork are also those that pro-
vide the patron with the capital to acquire art (Grasskamp 1992, 83). Corporate cul-
tural politics, articulated in sponsoring philosophy, draws on the notions of alterity
(cultural difference), aura (in Walter Benjamin’s sense), and the shock of the avant-
garde, as well as of the transcendence and distinction of high culture, in order to effect
a symbolic or material exchange and social legitimation. The paradoxes between the
sponsoring philosophy (auratic, transcendent culture) and the sponsoring practice of
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 75

market organization cannot be reconciled without problematizing the social legitima-

cy of sponsorship itself. This would require a corporate cultural politics that recog-
nizes and critically interrogates the corporation’s own participation in the institutions
and processes of cultural production, distribution, and reception (Brock 1992, 33).

Absolut Style
In many respects, the Absolut promotional campaign was less about the use of art in
advertising per se (for this had been done before) than about re-signifying the social
function of contemporary art itself in order to access subcultures of consumption,
who would accept the product as part of a lifestyle orientation. The fusion of art and
advertising also facilitated a transfer of the image of patronage from the sponsor to
consumers, that is, by linking a lifestyle of arts appreciation (visiting museums, at-
tending concerts and cultural events) with one of arts consumption or patronage (ac-
quiring art and music).17 Thus, consumers could become “patrons” in their own right.
This link between arts appreciation and arts consumption was accomplished by
creating an image and sociocultural profile for the product. Because mass-market
products are frequently interchangeable, the product image is often divorced from the
material or visual characteristics of the product itself. This was certainly the case with
vodka, defined as a “neutral spirit without distinctive character, aroma, taste, or color”
(“Carillon Importers” 1992, 44). Absolut’s image was related to how and where it was
used and the associations of those who use it. It was strongly linked to relaxation and
leisure and presented as the drink of hip, culturally sophisticated professionals, partic-
ularly in urban settings, as well as of those who purchase art and antiques. Advertising
executive Manni Arlow characterized Absolut as clever, current (“It’s become part of
our society” [quoted in Lubow 1994, 79]) and contemporary (“Absolut changed the
name of sophistication in the liquor business” [“Carillon Importers” 1992, 44]). As
part of his effort to promote Absolut Vodka and, more importantly, to link it to con-
sumers’ lifestyles, “Roux was out most nights until the early morning ‘promoting the
brand’ (that is, drinking it) at fashionable bars and restaurants, meeting new artists,
signing up new work” (Lubow 1994, 68–69).
An integral part of engaging the lifestyle of Absolut customers involved the pro-
duction, promotion, and merchandising of other cultural products that complement-
ed the Absolut image (e.g., T-shirts). Sponsoring consultant Alfred Schreiber refers to
this promotional technique as “creating programs that interact with the consumers
themselves” (1994, 15). These promotions also addressed audiences directly through
“event-centered marketing”:
Most paintings have been unveiled in events held at the Whitney Museum, which have
attracted considerable media attention and targeted an upscale demographic seg-
ment. . . . In 1989, it [Absolut] sponsored a concert called “Absolut Concerto” at New

Figure 3.2. Absolutly Leibovitz: Absolut vodka celebrates its history of patronage as a “classic.” Photograph by
Annie Leibovitz.
76 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

York’s Avery Fisher Hall. The concert featured four new symphonic works that Absolut
had commissioned. Needless to say, a celebrity dinner followed. Absolut also commis-
sioned a song called “Absolut Lee” from Antonio Carlos Jobim, and sponsored Jobim’s
first American concert. Copies of “Absolut Lee” were later distributed to the entire
readership of Rolling Stone as bound-in recordings. (Schreiber 1994, 135–36)

Figure 3.3. A depoliticized Berlin Wall as museum piece and product promotion; it’s all part of Absolut lifestyle.
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 77

Schreiber describes the jazz sponsorships as “a logical extension of brand promotion to

a younger audience—a likely group of vodka buyers, comprised of various ethnic
groups and savvy urban whites” (136). Absolut had become a “badge product,” that is,
one that people would consume, wear, or display as an outward sign of distinction
(Lubow 1994, 65). As we have seen, however, distinction also implies social exclusion,
particularly for those who did not embody urban sophistication and style. Defining
who wore this “badge” and how they wore it became crucial for Roux. His colleagues
explain that “Roux saw a fat, slovenly man at Newark airport wearing an Absolut
T-shirt. Saying that he wanted it for his collection, Roux bought the garment for fifty
dollars, and stopped manufacturing Absolut T-shirts” (Lubow 1994, 68). Because
Absolut T-shirts had been absorbed by the mass market of middle-class America, they
no longer communicated the badge of social distinction. An egalitarian, equal-access,
consumer pluralism, in which everyone could buy the culture they could afford, had in
fact not replaced the hierarchies of taste and style.18 Roux wanted to craft an image for
Absolut that eschewed the overt symbols of wealth and power but covertly represented
socioeconomic exclusion.
Yet social exclusion can also be appropriated to signify stylistic exclusivity. This was
certainly the case with respect to Absolut’s marketing and promotion to urban gay
communities—in terms of both the sponsor’s politics of representation and its at-
tempts to communicate with new markets. Although most major corporations refused
to advertise in gay and lesbian publications, Absolut employed images of gay males as a
promotional vehicle in order to target urban, intellectual gays, as well as the larger in-
tellectual and artistic community in urban markets.19 Advertisers, like Absolut, “view
gay publishing as just another form of target marketing to reach a group with money
to burn” ( Johnson 1991, 31). Because urban, intellectual communities identify with gay
concerns (e.g., AIDS, censorship, local politics), advertisers employ images of gays to
attract attention to their products. “Embrace the Unknown,” a promotion for a new
vodka brand, Priviet, pictured an interracial gay couple. But Roux was particularly in-
terested in using images of gay males to reach wider audiences: “I don’t think the two
men should be run in a gay magazine. . . . I don’t want that kind of targeting. It could
be in Paper or Ocean Drive” (quoted in Lubow 1994, 64).
Raymond Foley, publisher of Bartender magazine, referred to Absolut as “a brand
that always leads the way in the liquor industry when it comes to exciting, socially re-
sponsible advertising and marketing” (quoted in “Carillon Importers” 1992, 44). Be-
yond the specific practices of the Absolut promotion, the appeal of creating images of
a socially responsible and culturally engaged corporation—in order to counteract the
pervasive negative images associated with the liquor or tobacco industries—is obvi-
ous. However, the appropriation of some images (gay males) and the exclusion of
others (middle-class overweight males) also reminds us that a significant motivation
for the projection of images and identities is even more pragmatic than winning or
maintaining a positive public image (although that is important too): These images
78 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

are ultimately based on expanding market share. The integration of cultural and social
sponsorships provides new channels of communication and contexts (e.g., events) in
which sympathetic consumers can be addressed. More importantly, such sponsorships
also facilitate the corporation’s own participation within those communities by situat-
ing it within networks of cultural production (artists) and mediation (museums).

“One World/One Store”: Benetton, Social Sponsoring, and Globalization

If the corporation has, as we have seen, assumed a pivotal position in redefining cul-
ture by ostensibly embracing and facilitating an inversion of the high/low hierarchy
in order to legitimize its own participation in culture, then it has simultaneously re-
formulated its participation in the construction of social identity and community by
redefining lifestyle (as organized consumption) in terms of social sponsorships.20 As a
function of corporate cultural politics, a major objective of cultural and social pro-
motions is participation in communities:
It’s not a question of simply taking your messages to the media . . . but of taking the en-
tire process one level higher by creating programs that interact with the consumers
themselves. . . . It may mean supporting social organizations that have particular mean-
ing for the people you are trying to reach . . . [in] the arts, sports, schools, local govern-
ment, nonprofits, festivals, or community development programs. The first steps . . .
are to identify . . . the target markets you want to reach . . . then to work backward . . .
to become involved with specific programs . . . and convey a strong profile for your
products or services. (Schreiber 1994, 15)

Schreiber (in the subtitle of his book) calls this new form of lifestyle marketing “Build-
ing the New Customer Partnership.” The “partnership” involves more-direct partici-
pation in the construction and organization of communities than occurs in tradition-
al philanthropy. Although promotional campaigns, like Absolut Vodka’s, attempt to
signify products through identities (e.g., urban gay males), social sponsoring inserts
the interests of the corporation into the local contexts of sociocultural interaction.
This process increasingly involves the sponsor in the construction of ethnic, gender,
and regional or national identities.
One of the most visible and controversial forays into the construction of social
identities has been the series of Benetton advertising campaigns that began in 1984
with the “All the Colors of the World” campaign. Although Benetton did not initially
sponsor events (such as concerts for nonprofit causes), it created media events that
provided a basis for consumer identification based on strong affinities with social
causes. Photographs of impoverished children working at a construction site in a de-
veloping country, a duck swimming in an oil spill, or human body parts stamped
“H.I.V. Positive” created outrage but also considerable attention in the international
media by removing these photographs and texts from “the ghetto of advertising”
(Schnibben 1992, 120). However, Benetton was less concerned with the negative re-
sponses among older consumers and media critics (conservative or liberal) than with
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 79

the reactions of their target audience of young consumers, who had considerable dis-
posable income and were inured to the routine promotion of entertainment and con-
sumer products. Initially, Benetton’s audience seemed to belong to “Generation X,”
that is, young adults 16 to 27, whom sponsors perceived as “highly astute judges of the
media,” conscious of style, and “concerned with AIDS, the environment, racial equali-
ty” (Schreiber 1994, 48, 238).
Benetton addressed this younger audience with images of social conflict and in-
justice. Perhaps its advertisements were successful in part because they effected the
transformation from the marketing of lifestyle, imaged as entertainment and con-
sumption, to the marketing of lifestyle orientations based on products linked to so-
cial causes (Schreiber 1994, 238–39). Large segments of affluent youth markets in in-
dustrial countries are receptive to overt communication on social issues. Purchasing
Benetton products may have intensified Generation Xers’ sense of participation in
social causes and provided a feeling of empowerment by offering them the opportu-
nity to spend their money for clothing with a corporation that claimed to share their
concern for social issues. Unlike the stereotype of anticonsumerism associated with
their parents’ generation of the 1960s, Generation Xers were more concerned with
how and what they consumed (Schreiber 1994, 48). Even if the consumers of Gen-
eration X were sometimes skeptical of Benetton’s motives, they perceived that their
money did not go to an “anonymous” corporate entity whose social politics were un-
known (Schreiber 1994, 238). Benetton’s advertisements made a case for its progres-
sive corporate social politics, although the case may have not been credible for many
consumers.
Henry Giroux argues that social conflict is defused or contained in Benetton’s pro-
motional strategy by depoliticizing aspects of everyday culture (1994, 196). The politi-
cal contours of social inequality are flattened and relativized. Lifestyle is defined
through a diversity of stylistic distinction within the pages of Colors (Benetton’s maga-
zine for its customers):
Interspersed amid commentaries on music, pizza, national styles, condoms, rock stars,
and the biographies of various Benetton executives, Colors parades young people from
various racial and ethnic groups wearing Benetton apparel. In this context, difference is
stripped of all social and political antagonisms and becomes a commercial symbol for
what is youthfully chic, hip, and fashionable. At the same time, Colors appears to take
its cue from the many concerns that inform the daily lives of teenagers all over the in-
dustrialized world. (Giroux 1994, 196)

The images in the Benetton advertisements provide an organizing filter for the inter-
pretation of social reality and conflict. Many of the promotions appropriate post-
modern strategies of contingency and the use of a documentary-style photography;
their “structuring principles are shock, sensationalism, and voyeurism,” which func-
tion in terms of “offering its [Benetton’s] publicity mechanisms to diverse cultures as a
unifying discourse for solving the great number of social problems that threaten to
80 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

uproot difference from the discourses of harmony, consensus, and fashion” (Giroux
1994, 196, 203).
From an audience perspective, the impact of the Benetton advertising campaigns
may be difficult to assess. The promotions were obviously very successful in creating a
positive, socially concerned image for the stores among youth markets despite court
decisions banning some of the advertisements that were deemed exploitive in several
European countries (Germany, France, and Italy).21 The success of Benetton’s adver-
tisements among teenagers and young adults seems to indicate that they accept its
commercial interests as a fact of the marketplace but are simultaneously attracted by
its socially provocative advertising, which distinguishes it from other image-oriented
promotions such as those for fashions and perfume. Teenagers like the aggressive,
provocative, “in-your-face” stands on social issues, but they also recognize that
Benetton’s motives are not completely altruistic.22 Indeed, Benetton’s image within
subsequent generations of younger consumers, such as “Generation Y” (the successor
to Generation X), may be fading as a result of constantly changing fashion trends, as
well as Benetton’s “down-market” retailing with chains such as Sears.23
I would argue that Benetton’s involvement in social issues primarily fosters a com-
munity of consumers rather than communities of participants engaged in addressing
common concerns. Even if we assume that Benetton was encouraging alliances be-
tween its audience and socially active nonprofits such as Greenpeace, Amnesty
International (Ayub 1993, 66–68), or the SOS Racisme (for which it sponsored a
conference), the corporation’s advertisements do little to educate or inform audiences
of more-complex underlying issues (e.g., the ramifications of and its own involve-
ment in corporate globalization). As Hans Haacke has pointed out, the corporation
does not donate funds to charitable or advocacy groups, and its labor relations prac-
tices are hardly progressive (i.e., its ongoing support of textile subcontractors who
often provide workers substandard working conditions and wages) (Haacke 1995,
228–35).24
Benetton has defined communities of participation primarily with respect to two
sites of consumption and promotion: its megastores and Benetton Web sites. The
megastores are designed as surrogate meeting places for a global community:
The megastore is more than just a retail outlet, it is also a place for people to meet and
get together. Benetton has always aimed to be more than a global group manufacturing
and selling clothes; it has also promoted an open and international lifestyle, and the
new megastores are an essential part of this concept. (Benetton Web site)

Both the megastores (locally) and the Web site (globally) represent attempts to inter-
vene in and organize communities in terms of a lifestyle of consumption. Benetton’s
“One World/One Store” advertisements portraying multiethnic, multicultural mod-
els reflect what Malcolm Waters has termed a “complex interweave of homogenizing

Figure 3.4. Alliances for social causes and self-promotion.

82 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

with differentiating trends” characteristic of globalization (1996, 139). The “One

World/One Store” advertisements globalize the symbolic exchange of Benetton prod-
ucts through social identities and issues while localizing the material exchange of con-
sumption through the siting of its urban megastores. Although the promotional text
of the Web site attempts to present images of a progressive, socially responsible corpo-
rate politics, it actually reverts to older models of international understanding
through commerce:
Ten new stores have opened in Syria, where Benetton is the only foreign clothing brand
present in the market. Since 1995, moreover, Benetton has been present in Pakistan,
where the first store was inaugurated by ex–Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. (Benetton
Web site: “The Commercial Network”)

While social sponsorships and promotions, through their very existence, reveal the
extent to which commerce, culture, and politics are interwoven into everyday life, they
simultaneously deflect attention from the corporation’s own social, economic, and cul-
tural politics of local or global workplaces.25 They redefine the sites of symbolic and
material consumption (e.g., shopping centers, megastores) as places where milieu-
specific values (e.g., ecological concerns, diversity, multicultural understanding, family
values) can be reinscribed and mediated. Benetton’s upscale mall location, the urban
megastore, and the corporate Web site provide the contexts within which shared alle-
giances to social causes and the lifestyles of teens (with significant disposable incomes)
can be channeled into consumption. Just as Absolut Vodka was designated a badge
product, Benetton clothing also became a badge for shared lifestyles that aspired to so-
cial equity but failed to link them to organized efforts for social action (such as Am-
nesty International or Greenpeace).
Community partnerships or local alliances with educational institutions, health
care, and nonprofit organizations solidify and legitimize the role of the sponsor as a
participant in the formation of social policies (education, government, social welfare).
Indeed, the participation of corporate sponsorship in education and local nonprofits
in the United States is increasingly taken for granted and is becoming an essential
component of such organizations’ financial stability. Social sponsoring, like cultural
sponsoring, is often more than just image promotion; it also integrates product pro-
motion into nonpromotional contexts. Social sponsorships in education, for example,
involve direct and indirect forms of product placement and merchandising in the
classroom in order to promote new educational products as well as consumer prod-
ucts targeted to children.26 These programs underscore the increasing role of educa-
tional and cultural institutions (e.g., schools, museums) as sites of consumption and,
conversely, the use of malls, megastores, and theme parks (e.g., Disney World, Epcot)
as sites of socialization and education.27

A “Genuine” Saxon
Benetton’s social advertisements and the controversy regarding their legitimacy or
legality illustrate the extent to which corporate interests are embedded in the con-
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 83

texts of social relations and their power to construct or frame identities. However,
the corporation’s projection of itself as a participant in public discourses on social
issues—accompanied by the signifiers of corporate image (e.g., logos or brand-name
products)—ultimately points to its own interests in constructing social relations.
These politics of representation have become very visible in postunification Germany
as it moves from a rather homogeneous to a more multicultural society. Indeed, no-
tions of German identity and nation were increasingly problematized as tensions be-
tween East and West Germans and relations between Germans and ethnic minorities,
migrants, and asylum seekers became the focus of social, political, and cultural debate.
The resurgence of right-wing and neo-Nazi groups and of hate crimes against ethnic
minorities after unification also coincided with new waves of political refugees and
other asylum seekers.28
During the early 1990s, religious and nonprofit groups realized that their cam-
paigns to combat hate crimes could not reach mass audiences without the type of
media coverage and public actions used successfully by groups such as Greenpeace
and Amnesty International (Stolz 1993, 56–57). Rock concerts and other events de-
signed for regional and global causes (e.g., AIDS, Hunger in Africa) were recognized
as effective vehicles for fund-raising and consciousness-raising efforts (Stolz 1993, 57).
The impact of social advertising (positive or negative) reinforced the potential for
commercial sponsorships in the social sector in Germany. Regional initiatives sup-
ported by coalitions of religious, social, professional, and political groups induced the
national and local media (television, radio, press)—including Germany’s major public
and private television stations, ARD, ZDF, RTL, and MTV—to contribute free air-
time and advertising space for spots (Stolz 1993, 57–58). Coalitions of human rights,
political, and religious groups sponsored candle-light vigils (Lichterketten)—human
chains of silent protest strung throughout urban centers (e.g., in Berlin, Munich, and
Frankfurt am Main).29
Although many media, such as Munich’s Süddeutsche Zeitung, supported the
Lichterketten without using them as a promotional vehicle, other media combined
public information with public relations. One issue-oriented social advertisement
sponsored by the Sächsische Zeitung—and voted the best of the year by one hundred
advertising executives—illustrates the attempt to construct German identities in
terms of multiculturalism. The newspaper’s advertisement is a black-and-white
frontal photograph of Sam Njankono Meffire, an African German born in Zwenkau
(in Saxony). Meffire appears underneath large, black, bold letters declaring, “Ein
Sachse” (“A Saxon”). The advertisement (part of a series of promotions called “Ein
Sachse”) asks the reader to accept Meffire—who worked with skinheads after unifica-
tion and protected “foreigners” during his training as a policeman—not because he
is different but precisely because he is not; that is, he is “a Saxon,” a German, a police-
man (and thus legally not designated a “foreigner”) (Leif and Galle 1993, 9).
The advertisement undermines the notion of a German cultural identity based on
ethnicity by intentionally addressing audiences (i.e., the radical right) who would re-
ject the visual provocation of a black Saxon. In designing the advertisement for the
84 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

Figure 3.5. Diversity sponsoring for social causes. The heading reads, “A Saxon.” Text at lower left reads, “Sam Njankono
Meffire, born 1970, in Zwenkau, Saxony.” Text at lower right reads, “There are more Saxons than one thinks. Every day
about one million of them read the Sächsische Zeitung—one of German’s largest newspapers. . . .”

Sächsische Zeitung, Scholz & Friends (considered one of Germany’s most innovative
advertising agencies) (Hardenberg 1998, 47) attempts to confront the radical right
with the contradiction, which it refuses to accept as reality. However, this confronta-
tion is only accomplished by simultaneously inscribing a binary and assimilationist
view of identity that projects Meffire as a true “Sachse,” erasing any vestiges of
Meffire’s own ethnicity and social status as a man of color living in Germany.
Moreover, the visual and textual discourse of the advertisement clearly privileges the
notion of German identity (intensified through the notion of the “Saxon”) over any
sociocultural significance of ethnicity. The advertisement’s headline declares Meffire is
a German (and his legal and social status as a policeman affirms this), rather than sug-
gesting the much more threatening notion that he should be accepted on the basis of
not being German, for example, as a migrant or asylum seeker, whose legal status may
be indeterminate. Thus, the scales of binary opposition between German and non-
German—an implicit component of the advertisement’s attempt to argue that such
differences are not important—tip in favor of validating that which is German. That
is to say, despite all, Mefirre is ultimately a Saxon. Indeed, the ad’s text states, “There
are more Saxons than one thinks.” More significantly, the notion of a hybridization of
identities in Germany, which would explore or provoke the tensions between Meffire’s
social status and professional identity (as a policeman) within Saxony as well as the
manner in which his status as an African German alters his social identity, is over-
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 85

looked as a potentially productive perspective in approaching a dialogue on multicul-

turalism and Germany.
Of course, the advertisers would argue that the objective of the promotion is to
reach their audience on an emotional level rather than through differentiated argu-
mentation. They are simply applying the strategies of contemporary fund-raising for
social causes. Dieter Stemmle, a professional fund-raiser, refers to the power of the
visual idiom to appeal to audience values by linking them to an emotional experience,
or what Stemmle describes as the experience of viewing the advertisement:
In the social sphere, dealing with values is a part of all forms of corporate identity.
These values are not simply a given. Rather, they are exchanged, in communication, in
personal encounters, and in the manner and way of human existence. Values are expe-
rienced. They emerge from the depths of the human being and become an experience
[Erlebnis]. Sometimes they are authentic, sometimes bold yet simple, sometimes quite
human, and sometimes they are foolish. Values can move people and their moods. New
value orientations can conquer borders and even tabus. (1993, 27–28)

Yet the distinction between appealing to sympathetic audiences and “conquering bor-
ders” is crucial—particularly the assumption (by the Sächsische Zeitung and the adver-
tising agency) that the radical right can be reached through campaigns in mainstream
print media. The advertisers for this campaign believed it could. Sebastian Turner,
managing director of Scholz & Friends during the promotion, explained the strategy
of using a visual provocation for the advertisement featuring Meffire: “Those who
hate foreigners tune out when they are confronted with logical arguments. Therefore
the advertisement must be understood faster than an individual full of hate can turn
the page” (quoted in Leif and Galle 1993, 9). Although those who commit hate crimes
do not respond to “logical arguments,” the strategy of visual provocation based on
emotional responses can also illicit the opposite response: The perception that mi-
norities (a black man) have become part of the power structure (a policeman) may
provide simply another provocation to resist institutional power and assert that those
social institutions have been taken over by non-Germans. Although both the Benetton
and Sächsiche Zeitung advertisements employ similar discursive strategies of visual
provocation related to social issues, they address fundamentally different audiences.
Benetton’s youth market is basically sympathetic to the corporation’s products and
message, but the Sächsische Zeitung’s audience lies outside of the paper’s readership
and perceives the message as a challenge to its own values. Although the two forms of
promotion pursue different strategies of representation, both actually depoliticize eth-
nic diversity and political difference.
This is illustrated in another advertisement for the Sächsische Zeitung (designed by
Scholz & Friends) in the series “Ein Sachse,” which pictures the German Reichstag
with the familiar headline: “Ein Sachse.” As part of the advertisement for the news-
paper, the reader is told that the Reichstag was constructed of Saxon sandstone. In
86 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

this case, identity and community are constructed as the assimilation and conver-
gence of regional with national identity. Saxony, as a “new” state in the unified
Germany from the former German Democratic Republic (GDR), is aligned with the
quintessential signifier of German national identity, the Reichstag. In this respect, the
advertisement is an affirmation that its readers are also “authentic” Germans, part of
the history and tradition of Germany, rather than citizens of the former GDR who
have been assimilated, or colonized, by the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG). The
manifest political and economic conflicts within postunification Germany are erased
in favor of the integration of regional and national identity. Indeed, the promotion
appropriates the Reichstag as “A Saxon” not only in order to establish Saxony’s own le-
gitimacy as “authentically German,” but also in order to state unequivocally that the
core of being German (i.e., the national identity associated with the Reichstag) is
Saxon. Thus, the advertisement trumps the West Germans by declaring that the
Reichstag belongs to Saxony, and in doing so it also tentatively asserts Saxony against
its neighbors to the west according to the motto, “Not only are we Germans too, but
we are the real Germans.”
In many respects, German corporations are only beginning to explore sponsorships
that construct ethnic and national identities.30 However, they are likely to increase as
minorities gain access to greater economic, political, and social power in Germany. Al-
though levels of social sponsorships in Germany are relatively low (in comparison to
sponsorship of sports and cultural programming), they are increasing dramatically in
response to budget constraints, particularly in the new states where the demands for
social infrastructure continue to grow.31 Organizations such as Aktion Kontrapunkt,
which actively solicits sponsors for programs to combat xenophobia through support
of intercultural groups, or Sozialsponsor in Aachen, which supports a variety of social
organizations in the city of Aachen and makes its logo available for contributors, can
now be approached through professional sponsoring agencies such as the Europäische
Sponsoring-Börse, an online clearinghouse for sponsoring projects.32
As sponsorships within the area of multicultural projects increase, they will in all
likelihood follow similar trends in U.S. image and product promotion, which inte-
grate social sponsorships with marketing and promotion. During the late 1990s, eth-
nicity was rapidly introduced into German advertisements in order to signify shifts in
values among younger, more affluent consumers. Changes in the traditional family in
Germany to “mixed marriages” and “blended families” were appropriated, not to pro-
mote diversity or understanding but to link a product with these values and identities.
The first page of one such advertisement for Audi features a white father and mother
with a black son and Asian daughter. The caption reads, “Does a family have to look
like a family?” In response, the second page of the ad shows a new automobile with

Figure 3.6. Identity politics in postunification Germany: Who is more German? The image here is the German Reichstag
prior to renovation. The heading reads, “A Saxon.” Text at lower left reads, “The Reichstag building. Constructed from
1884 to 1894, from Saxon sandstone.” Text at lower right reads, “There are more Saxons than one thinks. Every day about
one million of them read the Sächsische Zeitung—one of Germany’s largest newspapers. . . .”
88 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

the caption, “Does a limousine have to look like a limousine? The new Audi A6.
Visions begin with questions” (Hardenberg 1998, 48).
Multiculturalism has also become an image factor of regional marketing within
Germany and the EU. In the state of Mecklenburg–West Pomerania, for example, an
image advertisement of two Japanese students studying piano at the University for
Music and Theater in Rostock is designed to address negative images of Rostock and
of the state (as a result of hate crimes during the early 1990s) by positioning them as a
site of culture, open to and sought out by foreigners.33 The advertisement plays on
images of the “east”—Japan and East Germany—in order to link the cultures of “the
distant old east” with “the new German northeast.” Mecklenburg–West Pomerania is
projected as tourist-friendly, cultivated, and open to foreigners. Indeed, the final line
of text addresses the negative image of the region, concluding, “Just in general, a lot of
things are different than you think.”34 Both the Audi advertisement and the promo-
tion for Mecklenburg–West Pomerania want viewers to associate their products with
open-mindedness, innovation, creativity, and cultural diversity. These advertisers
seem to be telling their readers that their products provide a validation for these new
values and identities to which Germans, individually and collectively, aspire.
Among some nonprofit organizations, corporate involvement in social marketing
has been viewed with considerable skepticism. Amnesty International in Germany has
rejected sponsorships by the Body Shop cosmetics chain, despite agreements between
the corporation and other Amnesty International chapters in the EU (e.g., the United
Kingdom) and internationally (Ayub, 1993, 66–69). Some consumer groups in Ger-
many have also been proactive in attempting to limit the extent to which firms can link
support for ecological groups with their product image.35 Although there may be resis-
tance to such overt forms of social sponsoring as image promotion, the social policies
of privatization in Germany have already legitimized greater involvement by the cor-
porate sector. Moreover, as the national entities of international organizations begin to
solicit funds multinationally within the EU’s single market, administrators of groups
such Amnesty International and Greenpeace foresee increasing competition for contri-
butions within and between their organizations (Ayub 1993, 66).
Whereas regional cultural diversity may be employed in order to open market
niches in the competition for a presence in European urban centers, the political and
social conflicts of ethnicity, gender, sexuality, or nationality are promotionally defused
or dissolved in order to facilitate the globalization of market interests. In a sense, the
reconfiguration of German identity (including the identity of the “New Berlin”) ex-
pressed through the filter of corporate promotion and social sponsorships may mirror
the dynamics and tensions occurring within the EU at large. As David Morley and
Kevin Robins observe, concepts of diversity and community become even more prob-
lematic as the EU attempts to integrate dissonant identities within Europe into an
idealized projection of the “New Europe”:
The language of official Euro-culture is significant: it is the language of cohesion, inte-
gration, unity, community, security. The new European order is being constructed in
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 89

terms of an idealised wholeness and plentitude, and European identity is conceived in

terms of boundedness and containment. (1995, 189)

Multicultural and Diversity Sponsoring

Buying Events—Defining Communities
Based on their extensive experience in ethnic marketing in the United States, many
multinational corporations have considerable experience in multicultural sponsor-
ships that can be used to access emerging markets in Germany. Sponsorships in the
United States attempt to fuse notions of ethnicity, national identity, and community
by integrating social and cultural sponsorships. In societies characterized by mass-
produced consumer products, the notion of “difference” provides a vehicle for distin-
guishing brand-name products as well as addressing expanding minority markets. For
example, AT&T’s “New Art/New Visions” program shows work by women and
“artists of color” while providing financial aid for galleries to show and acquire the
works. However, AT&T concedes that it is also addressing women and African Ameri-
cans, who purchase an increasing portion of services from the corporation. And by
spending $100,000 to sponsor a retrospective show of Jean-Michel Basquiat’s work
at New York’s Whitney Museum, AT&T (like other firms) also hoped to balance its
image of only supporting traditional high culture (“Politically Correct Patrons” 1992,
89). (Yet the audience for the shows at the Whitney could hardly be considered demo-
graphically diverse.)
Although African Americans compose the largest minority population within the
United States, the majority of diversity-oriented sponsorships are directed to the
Hispanic community (Thomas Harris 1993, 268). Although market analysts disagree
as to the causes for this disparity, many believe that it is related to linguistic difference,
which facilitates targeted communication with Hispanic communities and higher lev-
els of brand loyalty in comparison with other ethnic groups (Fry 1991, 12; Thomas
Harris 1993, 268–69). Corporations have been extremely successful in merging social
and cultural sponsorships with product promotion through cultural festivals for
Hispanic communities. Indeed, most major Hispanic events now include extensive
sponsorships.
More than 1.5 million people attend the annual Calle Oche (Carnival Miami),
which is supported by one hundred corporate sponsors, including Anheuser-Busch,
AT&T, Campbell’s Soup, Coca-Cola, and Colgate-Palmolive (Freeman 1998, S-12;
Thomas Harris 1993, 265). Puerto Rican Day and Hispanic Day parades in New York
or Fiesta del Sol in Chicago provide popular-culture venues for product promotion
and sampling (Thomas Harris 1993, 266). Because the impact of the promotional
message is diffused through the participation of numerous sponsors, many corpora-
tions are now organizing and “buying” their own events, such as the International
Salsa Festival in Miami coordinated by WLTV-TV and sponsored by Anheuser-Busch,
which acquired exclusive rights to sell Budweiser beer at the festival (Freeman 1998,
S-13). Laurie Freeman concludes, “As advertisers begin demanding more impact from
90 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

sponsorship, events will have to be tailored more to companies’ wishes” (1998, S-13).
We see once again that corporate sponsors, by buying and producing their own
events, have assumed the functions of cultural producers and promoters in order to
define contexts of cultural production.
Most programs accentuating ethnic minorities integrate a variety of sponsored
projects with links to local educational institutions, museums, and the media. The
objective of many of these sponsorships is to embed products within an entertain-
ment event. Kodak sponsors Hispanic festivals where participants can be photo-
graphed with television celebrities from Telemundo (a Spanish-language TV net-
work). Families pose for photos together in an Outdoor Funshot Studio (and they can
also purchase film from a Kodak kiosk) (Fry 1991, 13). Family-oriented activities are a
vehicle for promoting picture taking as consumption and provide opportunities to
structure contexts of social interaction with the family and communities in terms of
lifestyles that consume themed environments. Events are also used to establish links
to community events and institutions; for example, Kodak sponsors the California
Museum of Latino History (Fry 1991, 13).
Support for local events, nonprofit groups, museums, and education functions to
legitimize and validate the corporation’s political and economic interests. Philip Mor-
ris, in the 1960s, became one of the first corporations to utilize extensive cultural spon-
sorships of theater productions, exhibitions, dance, museums, arts organizations, and
educational arts programs. In the Philip Morris Companies Incorporated Corporate Con-
tribution Guidelines for organizations seeking funding, Philip Morris employs notions
of community, diversity, and empowerment in order to maintain its socioeconomic
legitimacy, specifically within the following programmatic foci: education (teacher
education, training, and recruitment; adult literacy; K–12 education reform), the arts
(dance companies, theaters, music groups, museums), hunger and nutrition, conserva-
tion and environment, civic and community causes, and the AIDS epidemic.36
In its documentation of sponsored programs, Philip Morris and the Arts: 35 Year
Report, communities are defined in terms of diversity. However, diversity is multiply-
coded not only as cultural, national, ethnic, or gender diversity, but primarily as mar-
ket diversity:
In the 1970s and 1980s, Philip Morris began to broaden its business interests, strength-
ening its operations in other industries and other countries. The expansion of its work
force and markets enhanced the company’s interest in cultural diversity and gave rise to
a continuing series of exhibitions that examined and celebrated that diversity. (Philip
Morris and the Arts 1993, 3)

Contesting Public Policy

Philip Morris’s interest in maintaining its global and local economic interests is re-
vealed in its guidelines and criteria for sponsorship. Of the two criteria applied to all
grant proposals, the second asks, “Is the organization active in a community that has a
major Philip Morris operating company presence?”37 Thus, the link between economic
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 91

and cultural interests is clearly established from the outset. The corporation only agrees to
provide cultural support where it also maintains its economic interests. Although
these interests are clearly global (in terms of distribution and consumption), they are
physically present in the politics of space (manufacturing and administrative facilities)
and labor relations, which are key to retaining favorable conditions of production—
including issues of taxation, land use, and unionization. Maintaining a local power
base for labor and governmental relations through positive image projections (and es-
pecially through sponsorships of educational and arts programming) is a significant
component of corporate politics. Investments in social and cultural institutions are
bargaining chips that can be leveraged at the local or regional levels in order to vali-
date corporate legitimacy and responsibility. Yet at the same time, corporate interests
in protecting market share and profitability for brands are global. During the 1990s,
the regulation of tobacco (cigarettes) became the focus of public-policy debates both
in the United States and in the EU. In the United States, extensive class-action suits,
legal actions by attorneys general in many states, increased taxes on cigarettes, new
legislation regulating the sale of cigarettes to minors, and damaging revelations re-
garding tobacco industry practices all threatened the image and sales of tobacco manu-
facturers. Within the EU, bans were introduced on tobacco advertising and on sports
and cultural sponsorships by tobacco companies (using brand-name marketing and
merchandising).38
Philip Morris, like other corporations, is keenly aware of the impact of public poli-
cy upon its interests, and it addresses public policy in mass-media public-relations
campaigns and annual shareholder reports:
We understand that our stock price can be affected by investor concerns about the
public policy and litigation environment facing our tobacco business in the United
States. . . . First, we at Philip Morris believe in our businesses, our positions and our
people. We are proud of our work, our company and our employees. Second, we be-
lieve we are right and we are devoting all the necessary resources to our efforts. Third,
legal battles demand both patience and tenacity.39

The extent to which the tobacco industry perceived itself as embattled during the
1990s and beyond was revealed in its annual reports, which discussed at length the po-
tential impact of pending and proposed litigations and taxation on the “business envi-
ronment.”40 As a result of litigation and legislation, as well as extensive media cover-
age of industry cover-ups regarding the harmful effects of tobacco, Philip Morris
launched a series of new public promotions highlighting its past work as a good cor-
porate citizen, for example, providing bottled water from a Miller Brewing Company
plant in a flooded community or contributing to shelters for abused women.41
The relations between corporate interests and public policy are contested by the
corporation within local, national, and global contexts. In these contexts, sponsorships
provide a medium to construct corporate images and to define “alliances” or “partner-
ships” with consumers and institutions (based on markets). With regard to tobacco-
related lawsuits in the late 1990s, Philip Morris attempted to placate its shareholders
92 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

by stating, “We’re fighting for our rights and the rights of our consumers.”42 Yet the to-
bacco corporations recognized they would lose the public-policy battle in the long run,
and they accordingly shifted their public relations to a more conciliatory tone of cor-
porate citizenship in the face of the negative publicity. In this sense, Philip Morris’s
Corporate Contribution Guidelines for sponsored programs from the early 1990s could
be read somewhat ironically. For they explicitly define the participation of the corpora-
tion as a central component of the community: “The relationship between a company
and its surrounding community is profoundly symbiotic. The welfare of one is tied
closely to the welfare of the other.”43

“Latin American Women Artists”: Brokering Identities or Organizing Markets?

Philip-Morris’s sponsorship of the exhibition Latin American Women Artists: 1915–1995,
organized by the Milwaukee Art Museum (MAM) in 1995, illustrates the degree to
which corporations have become participants in the construction and promotion of
“identity politics” and multiculturalism. In Milwaukee, Philip Morris and its sub-
sidiary Miller Brewing Company have established such symbiotic relationships re-
ferred to above, in part through sponsorships of the MAM since 1976.44 The institu-
tional relations between the sponsors (Philip Morris and the NEA) and the museum
are evident in the MAM’s press release on the Latin American Women Artists exhibi-
tion. The press release also signals the integration of Philip Morris into the cultural
context of the exhibition. The participation and contributions of Philip Morris func-
tion to frame the MAM’s own promotional text for the exhibition. The text of the
press release alternates between the museum’s descriptions of the significance of the
project as “the first large-scale exhibition in the U.S. to emphasize the important con-
tribution of Latin American women to 20th-century visual arts” and statements from
the sponsor (George L. Knox, vice president of corporate public affairs) that link arts
sponsorship with corporate business interests locally and globally (in Latin America):
Philip Morris’ long history of arts patronage and strong commitment to supporting the
achievements of less-recognized artists makes this exhibition particularly important to
our corporate arts support program and to our business relations within our communi-
ties both here and throughout the hemisphere.45

Philip Morris carefully maneuvers between its image as a multinational corporation

and as an arts patron. Whereas the press release refers to “arts patronage” and “corpo-
rate arts support program,” the Corporate Contributions Guidelines, the annual share-
holder reports, and the comprehensive Philip Morris and the Arts: 35 Year Report use
the terms “sponsorships” or “sponsored by,” which more clearly refer to the exchange
of capital and goods for image promotion. “Arts patronage” is obviously directed to
the high arts and media audience, including local opinion leaders in education, cul-
ture, business, and politics.

Figure 3.7. Sponsoring diversity, art promotes “corporate citizenship” and community relations.
94 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

Both the bilingual catalog and the press releases situate the significance of the exhi-
bition with respect to other important exhibitions of Latin American art. Rather than
breaking new ground, this project was designed to assemble works by more than 150
Latin American women artists in one retrospective exhibition; the artists included
Frida Kahlo, Tarsila do Amaral, María Luisa Pacheco, Olga de Amaral, Ana Mercedes
Hoyos, Ana Mendieta, María Magdalena Campos-Pons, Jac Leirner, and Leda Catunda.
Many works (e.g., those of Frida Kahlo) had been exhibited individually throughout
the United States and Europe but had never been organized thematically or chrono-
logically in order to present their collective contributions. Curator Geraldine P. Biller
emphasized that the exhibition was “even more impressive than the sum of its parts,”
underscoring the variety and diversity of interpretations, cultures, and artistic media.46
Diversity is clearly one of the central themes of the exhibit and its promotion:
In Latin American Women Artists, audiences will discover a rich variety and diversity of
images that dispels any perception of stereotypical Latin American or women’s art.
Visitors will also recognize their shared heritage in this hemisphere, and may gain a
clearer understanding of the historical, political, social and economic forces that have
shaped artistic developments during this century.47

For Philip Morris (and Miller Brewing), the notion of diversity is pivotal in cementing
its legitimacy and validation as an equal-opportunity, affirmative-action employer and
participant in community affairs. The references to the corporation’s “expansion of its
work force and markets” (Philip Morris and the Arts 1993, 3) come fully to bear in this
regard. The fact that Miller Brewing is a major employer in the Milwaukee area, with
a significant Hispanic population, was clearly a factor in the sponsorship, which was to
be a vehicle for reinforcing positive community relations.48 Moreover, diversity train-
ing and multicultural programming have become institutionalized within most major
corporations, not only as a form of documenting and implementing adherence to fed-
eral regulations but also as a means of improving internal labor relations within indus-
tries with minority populations (Gordon 1995, 18–19) and in order to access minority
markets.49
The final page of the Philip Morris and MAM press release is almost entirely pro-
motional in nature, devoted to enumerating Philip Morris’s cultural-diversity spon-
sorships with MAM and its other national sponsorships, such as of Black Art Ancestral
Legacy: The African Impulse in African-American Art (exhibition at MAM, 1990), The
Latin American Spirit: Art and Artists in the United States, 1920–1970 (exhibition at the
Bronx Museum of Arts, 1988), Ballet Hispanico of New York, and Intar Hispanic
American Theater and Repertorio Espanol.50 The promotional package for the spon-
sorship of the Latin American Women Artists also included the usual advertising in
major upscale magazines (e.g., Gourmet) repeating the diversity motif: “They speak
the same language. Yet each has something very different to say.” A series of cultural
programs accompanying the exhibition included music and theater with a Latin
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 95

American emphasis. Philip Morris also produced a video (Diverse Roots, Diverse Forms)
featuring “six artists whose work derives from their Latin American heritage.”
With respect to Latin American art and issues of multiculturalism, Mari Carmen
Ramírez has examined the changing role of museum curators in mediating culture
and identity. While operating as arbiters and brokers (who have become “sanctioned
intermediaries” within networks of museums, galleries, technical or professional ex-
perts, and sponsors), they simultaneously mediate the interests of artists (1996, 22).
Ramírez argues that as curators have become increasingly bound to these institutional
networks, they have reduced the scope of their curatorial roles. Although the histori-
cal notion of curators, as arbiters of taste, invested them with greater authority, it also
tied them to more elitist notions of curatorial practice and representation. Contem-
porary curators no longer function as authorities of cultural “excellence” but, rather,
as brokers of identities (Ramírez 1996, 22–23). Yet this transition is particularly prob-
lematic and inherently conflicted:
This situation places the cultural broker at the very core of a contradiction: on one
hand, she/he can be credited for helping to tear down art-world hierarchies, seeming-
ly democratizing the space for cultural action; on the other hand, in a market scenario
where “identity” can only be a reductive construct, the framing and packaging of im-
ages of the collective self can only result in a highly delusionary enterprise. The tensions
of this contradiction confront art curators with a dilemma: where should they position
themselves vis-à-vis the identities of the groups they claim to represent? (Ramírez
1996, 23–24)

Ramírez traces two important sets of interrelationships: (1) the evolution of Latin
American art within the contexts of its original production, and its promotion and
marketing in the United States through major exhibitions, and (2) conversely, the op-
positional and peripheral role in the United States of Latino art, which was gradually
integrated into the mainstream (30–33). These processes led to an eventual conflation
of Latin American and Latino art in the U.S. art market, but only after Latin
American art was first “mainstreamed” as a form of marginal art, “a term that could
only be used formerly to describe Latino art’s position with respect to the institutions
that exercise power in US society” (33). Many U.S. museums attempted to avoid the
more politically and socially volatile Latino art by purchasing Latin American works
that would absolve them of their responsibility to address Latin culture:
It was precisely the mainstream’s omnivorous demands for symbols of Latin culture to
placate the more radical demands of Latino groups that paved the way for the accep-
tance of Latin American art and identity in the United States. This fact suggests that
the conflation of identities between Latin American and Latino artists registered by the
recent exhibition boom, instead of presenting an alternative to the transnational flow
of identities, is an expression of the same demand for easily marketable and consum-
able cultural symbols. (26)
96 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

Corporate cultural politics appropriate Latin American art in order to legitimize

multinational financial interests in terms of (1) market expansion within Latin America,
(2) Latin American investment in the United States, and (3) the acceptance of local eth-
nic communities as markets. Ramírez argues that
one of the unacknowledged forms in which this exchange has taken place has been
through art exhibitions, which under the semblance of collective representation have
functioned to mask the complex process of validation of Latin American countries in
global financial centers represented by New York. Further complementing this flow of
identities from Latin America into the United States has been the presence of a post-
civil-rights Latino political and artistic movement acting within the broader parameters
of multiculturalism. (25)

Ramírez points to efforts by Latin American financial interests to promote their own
legitimacy within U.S. and European markets through the currency of cultural capi-
tal, arguing that there is a direct link between which artists are most desired by pa-
trons of Christie’s or Sotheby’s and which the Latin American nations have been most
successful in promoting their financial interests through the medium of cultural iden-
tity, “particularly Mexican, Colombian, Venezuelan and Cuban-American economic
elites” (30).
Although the sociopolitical forces redefining ethnic identities have presented
openings for museums to participate in the mediation of multiculturalism, these
identities have also been appropriated locally, nationally, and transnationally as vehi-
cles to legitimize financial interests. Ramírez concludes that the contradictory ten-
sions between the forces seeking integration (i.e., transnational capital, corporate
sponsors, and the art market) and the “democratic aperture exemplified by multi-
culturalism” (e.g., oppositional forms of art in the Latino communities) are being bro-
kered through notions of identity—as articulated in major exhibitions of Latin Ameri-
can art during the past few decades (34).51 Although Ramírez argues for a critical
curatorial practice that would foster this democratic aperture of a multiculturalism in-
corporating multiplicity and diversity of artistic practice, rather than reducing identi-
ty to a trope, she concludes that current circumstances severely limit this potential as a
result of commercialized art markets that are “increasingly driven by the marketing
and consumption of false difference” (1996, 35). Timothy Luke also points to the sig-
nification of Hispanic identity as a brand name within art markets:
The aesthetic reduction of Hispanic ethnicity to a narrow range of ritualized symbolic
identity, grounded upon long-gone or even mythical signs of authenticity, in itself does
tremendous violence to the real diversity, richness and mystery of the many different
Hispanic traditions. Yet, since the expectations of agencies, art galleries, and rich pa-
trons are primed with these dubious notions of “Hispanicness,” the artists still are
trapped into grouping their visions around this symbolic golden mean of taste or face
further poverty, greater obscurity, and worse neglect. (1992, 188)
 Redefining Culture, Absolutly 97

Sponsors have vested interests in framing and defining cultural contexts (such as
museum exhibits and cultural festivals) and in shaping representations of identity
(community, ethnicity, gender, nation) as vehicles for legitimizing their own partici-
pation. These interventions can function in terms of promoting a politics of pluralism
and difference defined as organized lifestyle and consumption. They simultaneously
function to defuse oppositional forces that present alternative or diverse models of
identity and community that threaten the spaces occupied by corporations. Corporate
participation in the production, mediation, and dissemination of culture has become
so much a part of institutionalized networks in the United States, that it is no longer
perceived as an “intervention.” References to community or arts “partnerships” and
“alliances” in education, cultural production, health, and labor reinforce and validate
the legitimacy of such participation (Schreiber 1994, 239–47). Although many corpo-
rations actually fund programs that might be considered oppositional or critical of so-
cial agendas or interests, their impact is frequently defused or appropriated as avant-
garde fashion (e.g., Philip Morris’s sponsorship of Bill T. Jones). More importantly,
corporate cultural programming frequently diverts attention from a more rigorous
and critical examination of its own institutional interests in local and global public
policies, a strategy that also attempts to neutralize the dissonances among culture,
politics, and economics.
By demanding that sponsorships only be granted in locales where the corporation
maintains operational interests (as Philip Morris does), corporations reveal the inextrica-
ble link between their economic and cultural interests, for example, between the factory
or workplace and the museum. In this instance, cultural sponsorship can only occur
where economic interests (corporate sites) exist from the outset. By diverting atten-
tion from the actual sites of corporate power and redirecting it to cultural production
(the sites of “arts support”) and social programs (for education, health care), corporate
cultural politics attempt to erase the nexus of economic and cultural interests (mani-
fest in contemporary culture) and to eliminate an interrogation of the “culture of the
workplace”—for example, of how social and cultural environments inside and out-
side corporations are organized. In other words, the corporation has defined the le-
gitimacy of its interests in community affairs through the power of capital. Yet it does
little to interrogate its own participation in the production and mediation of culture.
Nor does it recognize any attempt by communities or public interests (including the
sporadic attempts of stockholders) to question corporate policies as legitimate.
Redefining culture in terms of a genuine multiculturalism necessitates a dialogue
within and between cultures rather than a monologue that is primarily structured by the
institutional interests of cultural production (Jordan and Weedon 1995, 484–87). Rather
than attempting to fuse communities, social or cultural institutions, and workplaces
into seamless communities of consumption, the exploration and interrogation of their
conflict, difference, and diversity (which defines their boundaries) may potentially re-
veal the contours of and create the conditions for shared social spaces.
The need to experience difference as well as shared values is a significant force in
98 Redefining Culture, Absolutly

contemporary culture. Corporations have recognized the primacy of experience and

have organized much of their communication with respect to events. Corporate con-
sultant Alfred Schreiber writes, “We’re looking for something that’s rooted more in
experience than image” (1994, 246). Chapters 4 and 5 will investigate the interplay of
images (popular culture and photography) and experience (events) in corporate cul-
tural politics and the construction of identities. They will also examine various
modalities within the continuum of manipulation and resistance by exploring the
positions of artists—in collaborations with sponsors (Annie Leibovitz and American
Express) or in attempts to create noncommodified spaces for art (Christo and Jeanne-
Claude’s Wrapped Reichstag).
 4. Sponsoring Lifestyle:
Travels with Annie Leibovitz

In the mid-1990s, Life magazine featured Annie Leibovitz as “probably the most suc-
cessful photographer of her generation” and, as one writer suggested, “the Matthew
Brady of the baby boomers” (Van Biema 1994, 49).1 First at Rolling Stone and then
later at Vanity Fair, Leibovitz became known as the visual chronicler of the rock-and-
roll sixties to the Reagan-Kohl-Thatcher eighties. Her photographs of celebrity icons,
such as John Lennon and Yoko Ono, the Rolling Stones, or Ella Fitzgerald, became
staple commodities of popular culture. Writing for Time, Richard Lacayo plots the
trajectory of Leibovitz’s own career within the context of the transition from sixties
counterculture to mass media commercial culture of the eighties. More significantly,
Lacayo concludes that Leibovitz “has been a crucial figure in this transition”(1991, 74).
The road from Woodstock to Woodstock ’94 reflects Leibovitz’s own professional bi-
ography, from a photojournalist for Rolling Stone to celebrity photographer for Vanity
Fair. In addition to her work for mass-market print media, Leibovitz has also accepted
extensive commissions for corporate clients, including The Gap and American Ex-
press. She also produces for the art-photography market through periodic shows in
galleries and museums, as well as through book publications of her work. Indeed,
Leibovitz’s work in multiple venues and media, as well as her collaboration with cor-
porate sponsors, is characteristic of many contemporary artist-entrepreneurs.
This chapter will examine how the images of “celebrity” (mediated by the aesthet-
ic strategies employed in Leibovitz’s photography) construct contemporary images of
identity and place. Leibovitz’s projects (unlike those of other postmodern photogra-
phers such as Barbara Kruger or Cindy Sherman) do not inherently problematize the
uses of photography and representation; rather, they illustrate the problematic aspects
of postmodern photography within media culture (Kellner 1995). In terms of our dis-
cussion of the cultural politics of corporate sponsorship, the use of photography both
as a medium of visual communication and consumption and as contemporary art situ-
ates it precisely on the boundary of art and mass consumption—an attractive site for
corporate image transfer. For Douglas Crimp, photography assumes a pivotal position
in tracing the end of modernism and the turn to postmodern aesthetics:

99
100 Sponsoring Lifestyle

The centrality of photography within the current range of practices makes it crucial to
a theoretical distinction between modernism and postmodernism. Not only has pho-
tography so thoroughly saturated our visual environment as to make the invention of
visual images seem archaic, but it is also clear that photography is too multiple, too
useful to other discourses, ever to be wholly contained within traditional definitions of
art. Photography will always exceed the institutions of art, will always participate in
nonart practices, will always threaten the insularity of art’s discourse. (1993, 134)

It is important to identify postmodern strategies and artistic practices that incor-

porate elements of what Linda Hutcheon refers to as a “postmodernism of complici-
ty and critique” that simultaneously “inscribes and subverts the conventions and ide-
ologies of the dominant cultural and social forces of the twentieth-century western
world” (1991, 11) or to differentiate between a postmodernism of accommodation
and a postmodernism of resistance (Crimp 1993, 14). Leibovitz’s photography seems
to be primarily situated within a postmodernism of accommodation, yet many works
(including those for American Express) also present a potential for critique or resis-
tance. An analysis of Leibovitz’s photography—in terms of its representation of the
conditions of postmodern culture and with respect to postmodern photography in
general—illustrates the function of her work as a component of corporate cultural
programming and advertising and then situates its impact within the broader con-
tours of contemporary culture and society.
In order to understand how the construction of identity relates to the globalization
of corporate cultural politics, the following discussion positions Leibovitz’s work
within the processes and institutional matrices of its production, mediation, and
media reception through an investigation of (1) sponsoring, advertising, and lifestyle-
travel marketing at American Express; (2) the conceptual development of the “Por-
traits” advertising campaign and the collaboration between Leibovitz and American
Express; (3) the transformation and recontextualization of the “Portraits” from adver-
tisement to art exhibition; and (4) the representation of lifestyle, social milieu, and
identity found in examples of Leibovitz’s photography.

Consuming Lifestyles: Acquiring Cultural Capital

In 1992, American Express sponsored an exhibition entitled Annie Leibovitz: Photo-
graphs, 1970–1990, organized by the International Center of Photography (Rochester,
New York) and in cooperation with the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian
Institution (Washington, D.C.).2 The exhibition spanned Leibovitz’s work from the
black-and-white documentary style for Rolling Stone in the 1970s to color portraits for
Vanity Fair in the 1980s and 1990s. Photographs, which subsequently launched an
international tour in Munich, marked the culmination of an extensive collaboration
between Leibovitz and American Express, a collaboration that had begun with one of
American Express’s most successful advertising campaigns, “Portraits.” In many re-
spects, the success of the “Portraits” advertising campaign, which reinforced Leibovitz’s
Figure 4.1. Promotional brochure for the Photographs exhibition.
102 Sponsoring Lifestyle

style of celebrity portraiture as an identifiable commodity within mass-market maga-

zines, paved the way and “preprogrammed” the success of the subsequent Photographs
exhibition in international museums. For American Express, the sponsorship of
Leibovitz’s “art photography” in the form of an exhibition was a logical extension of
that same “promotional photography,” which could now be recontextualized and me-
diated via the museum.
In order to understand the significance of the Photographs exhibition in relation to
the “Portraits” advertising campaign, it is necessary to recognize the role of cultural
sponsorships at American Express. Rather than functioning as isolated instances of
corporate patronage or philanthropy, sponsorships are an integral part of the corpo-
ration’s marketing and communications strategy. The selection of forms of cultural
production that are suitable for potential sponsorships, as well as their conceptual
development, is orchestrated with marketing and image goals. Susanne Wegerhoff
(vice-president public affairs and communications at American Express International)
explained that
the psychographic communication goals, such as increased recognition of the corpora-
tion, of the trademark, as well as an improved image, are the primary point of depar-
ture for the formulation of objectives. In terms of objectives related to image, we are
primarily concerned with the improvement of the distinctive dimensions of image
(e.g., [those which are] dynamic, endowed with value, [or related to] exclusivity,
achievement). The atmosphere of the very real context in which cultural sponsorship
occurs (concerts, art exhibitions, theater, etc.) effects a direct transfer of the image from
the sponsored project to the sponsor. (1992b, 52)

The psychophysical semantics of an event-oriented society, theorized by sociologist

Gerhard Schulze, are reflected in the sponsoring practice described by Wegerhoff, that
is, merging the psychological recognition and anticipation of an imaged commodity
(e.g., an event) with the actual physical experience of that event (as a “consumable”
product) (Schulze 1992, 252; Weinberg 1992, 38). Events are the common denomina-
tor of sponsorships, utilized to access audiences and facilitate the image transfer from
event to sponsor (Bruhn 1991, 33). Wegerhoff emphasizes sponsoring’s potential to
leap-frog the communications barriers of an information society and thereby reach
audiences (“target markets”) directly within their own private sphere of experience,
such as at concerts, art exhibitions, or in the theater (1992b, 52).
American Express employs culture as an advertising medium for regional and
international products and services, in particular for lifestyle marketing to target mar-
kets utilizing travel and culture as consumer services. Who are these target markets,
and what forms of culture does American Express select in order to address them?
Wegerhoff explains that
corresponding to our global marketing orientation, the emphases [of our projects] are
those which cross boundaries. Their form and content are in harmony with the lifestyle
 Sponsoring Lifestyle 103

of our main target markets—cosmopolitan, culturally engaged, frequent travelers; con-

sumers who also have good earnings and buying power. . . . Thus the product image of
American Express and the character of the sponsored event also converge under the
sign of mobility which facilitates our core products in the most important area of
business—Travel Related Services (TRS). (1992b, 55)

The extensive collaboration with Annie Leibovitz provided the opportunity for Ameri-
can Express to coordinate three strategic areas of corporate communication: the prod-
uct image, the interests of their customers and target markets, and subsequently the
image of the sponsored project (i.e., Leibovitz’s Photographs exhibition). At this point,
we can anticipate and identify the projection of commodity images that are both em-
bedded in the “Portraits” advertisements and inscribed in the context of the Photographs
exhibition: lifestyle as distinction, exclusivity, individualism, or anticonventionalism;
notions of travel and mobility; and both local and global culture as a consumer product.

Designing “Portraits”
In 1986, the international advertising firm of Ogilvy & Mather developed the “Por-
traits” concept for American Express in order to replace an existing celebrity series en-
titled “Do You Know Me?” (Meyer 1988, 11). Although numerous high-profile fashion
photographers (including Richard Avedon, Irving Penn, Herb Ritts, Lord Snowden,
and Bruce Weber) were considered for the project, art director Parry Merkley chose
Annie Leibovitz because of her work with Vanity Fair, in particular “her use of color
and her ability to show familiar faces in a new light” (quoted in Meyer 1988, 11).
Within the advertising and communications industry, “Portraits” became one of the
most successful advertising campaigns of the 1980s. Leibovitz received the American
Society of Magazine Photographers’ Innovation in Photography Award for 1987. For
the German version of “Portraits,” featuring both German and international celebri-
ties, Leibovitz received the Art-Directors-Club Gold Medal and a silver medal for il-
lustration and print advertising in 1991.
The “Portraits” were effective advertisements precisely because they operated on
the boundary of advertising and art photography. In magazines, this was also the
boundary between advertising and editorial content. Rather than explicitly represent-
ing the commodity or services, the photographs initially replaced the product image
with a celebrity image (embedded within a very specific lifestyle context) and then
transferred that image back to the product (Wernick 1991, 99). From lifestyle maga-
zines to news magazines (Vanity Fair in the United States or Der Spiegel in Germany),
“Portraits” functioned in editorial and advertising modes. The photographs imaged
celebrity lifestyles while providing an advertising vehicle. As mass-circulation maga-
zines increasingly assumed the aesthetic strategies of advertisers, Leibovitz found a
forum for the development of her work within the portrait style that had now been
abandoned by Rolling Stone magazine. In an article on her work for American Express,
Stephen Meyer explains that
104 Sponsoring Lifestyle

during her [Leibovitz’s] last years at Rolling Stone . . . editor Jann Wenner began insist-
ing on close-cropped cover photos with direct eye contact. Studies had repeatedly
shown this style sells more magazines. “The person on the cover had to be recognized,”
Leibovitz adds, “That was a problem for me. I wanted more conceptual shots, ‘inside
shots.’ Part of my signature was that you could take a more complex shot and make it a
cover—that’s what they used to do at Rolling Stone. But you can’t do it anymore. For
any magazine.” (Meyer 1988, 19)

The work with American Express allowed Leibovitz “to do precisely what magazines
won’t let her do on their front pages” (Meyer 1988, 19). In an inversion, or conver-
gence of style and function, magazines became the promotional context for the edito-
rial style of the advertisement (Wernick 1991, 119). Many mass-market consumer mag-
azines had become promotional media designed to frame advertising. When asked
about differences between editorial photography and advertising projects, Leibovitz
responded, “I don’t see any difference. There’s nothing I’ve done for American Express
that I wouldn’t do for Vanity Fair” (quoted in Meyer 1988, 19). Nonetheless, Leibovitz
now rejects advertising projects that include direct product placement in the photo-
graph (Kanner 1988, 28), preferring to develop the “conceptual shots” that have be-
come her signature style for celebrity photography. This approach was well suited to
corporate marketing objectives, which increasingly reject explicit product advertising
in favor of a range of images related to the consumption of the product within culture
(Wernick 1991, 93, 117).
“Portraits” was conceived to offer the “inside story” on famous personalities. Each
photo was designed to reveal an aspect of a celebrity’s lifestyle that was not generally
known but that played a significant role in his or her personality (Econ 1992, 17).
Ogilvy & Mather rejected photographs of celebrities in their “normal” professional
surroundings. For example, Luciano Pavarotti standing with a pitchfork in front of a
barn on a farm outside Milan was chosen over a shot of Pavarotti in an opera house
(Meyer 1988, 18). Like Leibovitz’s photographs in Vanity Fair, each “Portrait” for
American Express became a “photo story,” a narrative, revealing the unknown, uncon-
ventional, or unexpected details of the celebrity’s life, with the background providing
context and completing the narrative. By simultaneously revealing and constructing
the private sphere of the celebrity, the photos functioned like coded tabloid stories,
with the celebrities as willing participants.3 The Ogilvy & Mather agency was able to
blur the conceptual boundaries between “editorial” and “advertising” functions and
styles by developing “editorial” shots profiling the celebrity rather than the product.
Moreover, the “Portraits” emulated the serial character of mass-market magazines by
introducing new celebrity photos on a regular basis (Wernick 1991, 107–11, 119).
In place of a lengthy promotional text praising the American Express Card or
celebrity endorsements, Ogilvy & Mather foregrounded the image of the celebrity.
This actually focused greater attention on the text: “Membership has its privileges.”
This brief statement created a conceptual link and image transfer (Bruhn 1991) be-
 Sponsoring Lifestyle 105

tween the celebrity image projected in the photograph and the corporate image medi-
ated through the iconography of the green or gold American Express Card. The sim-
plicity of the advertisement’s design focused the viewer’s attention on the photograph
while reinforcing the commodity sign of the corporate image (i.e., the credit cards).
The visual layout of the advertisements reveals that culture and capital are in-
scribed within the narrative of the celebrity photograph, which is positioned in the
center of the page, and within the celebrity’s American Express credit card (as a text),
which is located in the lower right (e.g., “Wim Wenders. American Express Member
since 1988”). First, the photo activates preexisting images of the celebrity and then
constructs another new dimension of that image. Second, the text-as-caption “names”
the celebrity and explicitly links him or her to the corporation by reproducing a fac-
simile credit card embossed with the celebrity’s name. The text over the credit card is
a direct appeal to the consumer: “Pay with your good name” (“Bezahlen Sie mit Ihrem
guten Namen”), while the celebrity’s name and the credit card itself are fused as com-
modities. Potential cardholders are not only acquiring the power of the card, but they
are also joining the ranks of the celebrity members and by association buying a part of
the image and the commodities-defining lifestyle.
The text on the German card, “Pay with your good name,”4 raises the credit card
icon to a second-order sign by substituting the card with the name on it. The adver-
tisement almost leads the viewer to believe that the card itself (in its material form) is
superfluous. (This is actually the case in telephone transactions, which only require a
name and an account number, and it may be the future of transactions based on a finger-
print or retinal scan.) The cardholder’s name replaces the card and embodies the power
to demand possession, a “privilege” (based on American Express’s slogan “Membership
has its privileges”) granted only to the few. Of course, the name signifies a promotion-
al appeal to the potential cardholder. By directly addressing the consumer, the person-
ality of the cardholder (signified by “your . . . name”) assumes a pivotal position with-
in the structure of the advertisement whereby the symbolic and economic potential
of the credit card “product” is temporarily subordinated to the personality of the
cardholder.
The projection of the consumer’s personality directly into the text of the adver-
tisement (i.e., by placing the statement “Pay with your good name” over the card)
counterbalances the dominance of the celebrity’s persona, which assumes center-stage
prominence. “Pay with your good name” is an appeal, suggestion, command, or rec-
ommendation from the celebrity to existing and potential members. Moreover, it in-
vests the cardholder with the status of name recognition. Indeed, the possession of
the card itself validates the cardholder’s credit status within the constantly expanding
spaces of consumption (in stores, restaurants, entertainment venues, etc.). Shifting
the focus from the celebrity photograph to the consumer’s perspective also operates
as a sort of preemptive strike within the overall logic of the advertisement by allaying
fears that the celebrity’s personality occupies a superior socioeconomic position.5
As a sign of capital accumulation, the card becomes the great leveler of cultural
106 Sponsoring Lifestyle

hierarchies (Schulze 1992, 167). By transforming prestige (which the celebrity possesses)
into economic status (possessed in varying degrees by both celebrity and cardholder)
and then transforming it back again, the card allows the cardholder to join the ranks
of the privileged (by virtue of the economic status that it represents). The possession
of the card effects its own image transfer as it links the sociocultural status of “respect”
and “privilege” with economic power. Cultural status and economic status merge and
become synonymous. Within the logic of the advertisement, the card represents the
potential for the accumulation and expenditure of economic and cultural capital that
can be traded back and forth in a sort of symbolic bank account (Bourdieu and
Haacke 1995, 18). In this respect, the linkage of the “Portraits” advertising campaign
with the sponsorship of Leibovitz’s Photographs exhibition defines cultural sponsor-
ships as the accumulation, transfer, and circulation of economic and cultural capital.
Yet the accumulated cultural capital of celebrity status can only be “traded” for the
economic capital of consumption (and vice versa) through the symbolic currency of
media culture (Kellner 1995). Those who have limited or modest celebrity status with-
in media culture (e.g., little-known artists) are perceived as possessing only nominal
amounts of cultural capital (defined in terms of the market value of their work). Ob-
viously, artists’ failure to successfully market or promote their own image within
media culture frequently leads to the failure of the work itself in the marketplace.
For the American Express cardholder, the economic capital expended to purchase
the privilege of participation in a cultural event is exchanged for the relative status of
the event itself and the prestige of attending it. The greater the expenditure, the high-
er the level of possible participation. Thus, American Express regularly offers card-
holders access to premieres of operas or to concert series through reserved blocks of
tickets. For example, the premiere of José Carreras in Carmen in Dortmund was re-
served solely for American Express members, who could also purchase a “VIP Pack-
age” entitling them to an exclusive entrance to both the performance and a cham-
pagne buffet. Such VIP events offer the potential to trade the cultural capital of the
event back into economic capital by networking with business and social contacts.
Thus, these events frequently function as stages for promotional representation rather
than as venues for the actual performance.

Photographs: Membership Has Its Privileges

In 1992, American Express sponsored the European premiere of the exhibition Annie
Leibovitz: Photographs, 1970–1990 at the Munich City Museum (Münchner Stadt-
museum) (MSM). The exhibition reinforced Leibovitz’s image as “a star who photo-
graphs stars” 6 and illustrates the coordination of cultural programming with advertis-
ing, lifestyle or event marketing, and the promotional interests of museums.
As is customary for most authors and artists with a high media profile, Leibovitz
was extensively engaged in promotional activities prior to and during the opening in
Munich. The opening itself was a media spectacle, extensively documented for
American Express by the communications firm ABC/EUROCOM, in order to track
 Sponsoring Lifestyle 107

the media’s reception of the sponsorship.7 Extensive reports and lead stories appeared
in more than one hundred publications, including Germany’s major print media
(Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Süddeutsche Zeitung, Abendzeitung, Die Welt, Das
Bild, Bunte, Vogue, Cosmopolitan), and on both public and private television and radio
(ARD, ZDF, Bayern 3, RTL plus, SAT 1, 3 SAT, WDR). ABC/EUROCOM referred
to the media coverage as a “nationwide media blitz” which supposedly reached 30 mil-
lion viewers (ABC/EUROCOM 1992, 1).
A primary focus of the initial reports in the German press was the spectacle of the
opening, rather than the exhibition itself; the actual photographs in their museal
function as representations of culture or art were subordinated to the projection of
their collective promotional image in the media. This promotion was facilitated
through two institutions of cultural production and mediation: the museum and the
corporate sponsor. In the case of the Photographs opening, both American Express and
the MSM were engaged in their own forms of self-promotion through the vehicle of
the exhibition. They were joined in this project by Annie Leibovitz (an artist-celebrity
in her own right) and the other German celebrities (e.g., Bernd Eichinger, Marianne
Sägebrecht, and Wim Wenders) who attended the opening. The synergy of local cul-
tural politics (i.e., Munich as a site for local and global culture represented by “person-
alities” and “dignitaries” from the arts, politics, and business) and corporate cultural
programming was facilitated by an “exclusive reception for Platinum Card Members”
hosted by Wolfgang Till (director of the MSM) and Jürgen Aumüller (president of
American Express TRS).8
Writing in the Süddeutsche Zeitung, Claus Heinrich Meyer speculated that the re-
ception was not really for Annie Leibovitz but was, rather, for an “intergalactic confer-
ence of the rich and beautiful” in Germany’s jet set. He concluded that they could be
divided into two groups: the celebrity-artists who had already been photographed by
Leibovitz (e.g., Marianne Sägebrecht and Wim Wenders) and those “personalities”
who wanted to join the exclusive circle of “members” but who had not been included
in the promotion (e.g., Duchess Gloria von Thurn und Taxis).9 Although the satirical,
and occasionally critical, tone in the media coverage indicated that the event was not
to be taken too seriously, many reports replicated the entertainment function of
celebrity lifestyles represented by the stylized self-irony of both the “Portraits” and
Photographs.10 Ultimately, most of the press reports performed promotional functions
by defining the exhibition primarily in terms of celebrity lifestyle. Because many re-
ports framed the discussion of Leibovitz’s Photographs in the museum exhibition with-
in the context of the preceding “Portraits” advertising campaign, distinctions between
promotional photography and art photography were effectively eliminated. By focus-
ing on Leibovitz’s dual role as artist and businesswoman, the media also reinforced the
merger of the artist and entrepreneur as well as the fusion of advertising and art.
The event (“opening of an art exhibition”) became a promotional sign for Leibo-
vitz, other artist-celebrities, the museum, and the sponsor. Indeed, all of the partici-
pants (including the media itself ) could profit from its direct and indirect promotional
108 Sponsoring Lifestyle

value, which included (1) higher media ratings resulting from the celebrity coverage,
(2) more visitors to the MSM and positive image promotion, (3) increased sales of the
Photographs catalog and note cards in the MSM and local bookstores, (4) publicity for
Leibovitz and for the other celebrities at the opening, (5) cross-promotion and rein-
forcement of the American Express “Portraits” advertising campaign, and (6) positive
publicity for American Express’s cultural programming within editorial and arts sec-
tions of the media. Cumulatively, these sites and discourses of promotion and con-
sumption perform a self-legitimizing function.
Apart from the institutional perspective of the culture industry, the VIP reception
illustrates how the representation of self (i.e., of individual or collective “celebrity”)
and Other are also fused within processes of cultural production and reception. Acts
of photographing (production), being photographed, and viewing photographs (re-
ception) are closely linked, even conflated.11 The celebrity audience at the opening is
the object of the exhibition itself. Celebrities are assembled to view the representa-
tions of themselves—their “promotional Other.” To the extent that they collectively
compose a social milieu (“international celebrities”), the celebrities are present not
simply to view their own pictures or those of their peers but also to promote them-
selves. By “performing” acts of viewing (in front of the international television and the
press photographers), they function simultaneously as performers and audience. In
many forms of cultural sponsorship, celebrity-artists occupy a preeminent position in
the communication and transfer of images:
Thus, within the wider economy of advertising the construction of show business
celebrity, indeed celebrity of every kind, serves as a kind of capital goods subsector, sup-
plying inputs both for the (self-) promotional activities of the culture industry itself,
and for those of commodity production as a whole. (Wernick 1991, 109)

Sponsoring and Kulturtourismus: On the Road

Although the sponsorship of the Photographs exhibition appears to have functioned
primarily on the level of image transfer and in the accumulation of cultural capital,
there were also tangible economic benefits built into an integrated marketing and pro-
motional program. By linking the exhibition and advertising to notions of lifestyle,
travel, privilege, and distinction, audiences were engaged in the consumption of
American Express services.
For American Express cardholders, one of the “privileges of membership” included
free admission to the Photographs exhibitions throughout Europe and in the United
States. Prior to the Munich premiere, German cardholders received a brochure with
information on the exhibition and on Annie Leibovitz (as “star photographer”). In ad-
dition to a description of the exhibition, cardholders were provided with lists of
Munich hotels, restaurants, and shops, all of which, of course, accepted the American
Express Card.12 Although the experience of “attending an exhibition” represents the
conceptual focus of the promotional information, this occurs within the context of a
lifestyle that includes a shopping trip, a meal in a fine restaurant, and perhaps a night
 Sponsoring Lifestyle 109

or two in a luxury hotel. These are all experiences that complement the experience (in
the sense of Schulze’s Erlebnis) of the “art exhibition.” The packaging and marketing
of consumption as an experience provides a form of orientation for the weekend visi-
tor to the art exhibition. In this respect, Schulze has emphasized the function of ad-
vertising in providing orientation and suggestions for consumers confronted with the
multitude of competing experiences in the marketplace (1992, 436, 442–43). Indeed,
the museum increasingly structures the experience of the museum visit in terms of
consumption, most visibly through restaurants, gift shops, or invitations to events.
Meanwhile, corporations accelerate the privatization of museum administration and
financing by renting museum spaces for exclusive corporate functions.
The sponsoring concept that linked the celebrity lifestyles projected in the “Por-
traits” advertisements to the Photographs exhibitions at international museums was de-
signed to achieve a higher profile for the American Express travel and leisure-activity
products and services. American Express defines international culture as a product
consumed by cardholders who are internationally oriented and mobile, with well-
defined, individualistic lifestyles (Wegerhoff 1992a, 6–7). Travel as consumption forms
an essential part of the act of participating in culture, particularly in global culture.
This is confirmed by John Urry’s analysis of postmodern tourism in his book
Consuming Places (1995). Here, Urry expands on the thesis that “places are increasing-
ly being restructured as centres for consumption” (particularly visual consumption)
(1). The privatization of public spaces and their reconfiguration as sites of consump-
tion also reflects a corporate politics of space (see my chapter 2). Moreover, the histori-
cal evolution of corporations such as the Thomas Cook travel company (or American
Express) has played a major role in the social organization of tourism and in structur-
ing how places are consumed aesthetically (Urry 1995, 142–43). First, corporations had
to cultivate the confidence of monied social classes, which would allow them to move
increasingly larger groups through time and space via transportation technologies.
Once this was accomplished, the sites for consumption could be expanded exponen-
tially. Thus, mobility is a concept central to the process of both modern and post-
modern societies (Urry 1995, 143). Furthermore, the packaging and structuring of
tourism in order to overcome resistance to geographic and national boundaries—the
promotion of “aesthetic cosmopolitanism” versus normative or cognitive emancipa-
tion (Urry 1995, 145)—has facilitated the transition to postmodern tourism as con-
sumption. The packaging of shopping, dining, staying at hotels, and participating in
cultural activities reflects the de-differentiation of spheres of social interaction so that
“tourism” is defined and legitimized in terms of leisure, culture, sports, education, or
hobbies (Urry 1995, 150–51).
The politics of space are directly related to corporate globalization and the articu-
lation of a global corporate cultural politics. Globalization, as an interplay of homog-
enizing and differentiating tendencies (Waters 1996), is manifest in corporate product
promotion and advertising, which devises specialized local campaigns for global prod-
ucts. In the case of “Portraits,” German celebrities provided local identification for a
110 Sponsoring Lifestyle

global promotion. Global integration, on the one hand, and individual differentia-
tion, on the other, are mediated by representations of exclusivity and mobility in
many of the “Portraits” advertisements. In “Portraits,” American Express combines
global marketing with a regional focus:
The goal of this campaign is to support and expand the world-wide market position of
American Express. . . . The selection of prominent figures is representative of this posi-
tion. “Portraits” is running primarily national, but also international, themes in Asia,
North and South America and in a few European countries. In each market the
Portraits-Series consists of a balanced mix of prominent figures from the areas of athlet-
ics, culture, politics, and business.13

The constellation of images involving travel or mobility and exclusivity are particular-
ly striking in a number of the “Portraits” advertisements developed for the German
market, including those of tennis star Michael Stich, director Wim Wenders, and ac-
tress Hanna Schygulla. Each of the advertisements was designed to address existing
and potential markets for American Express products by projecting milieu-specific
images and identities linked to global travel and consumption.

Michael Stich
Consonant with the campaign’s objective of presenting celebrities outside of their pro-
fessional context, Leibovitz’s photograph of Michael Stich takes him off the tennis
court and puts him in an oily repair shop. Stich, standing next to his vintage motor-
cycle in black leather pants and a black T-shirt with cut-off sleeves, is reminiscent of
James Dean or the young Marlon Brando. Stich’s motorcycle clearly refers to its icon-
ic function in popular culture in Europe and the United States, and in doing so it em-
ploys notions of freedom (defined as mobility), power (facilitated by speed), and indi-
vidualism. In discussing the effectiveness of these images in the advertisement, an
industry annual writes, “The newly-crowned Wimbledon champion “escapes” from
the white world of tennis to the oil-covered motorcycle workshop, where he lets the
camera capture his dream of the big freedom on two wheels” (Econ 1992, 19). Just as
jeans evolved from a symbol of sixties counterculture to a sign of middle-class lifestyle
(Schulze 1992, 313), the motorcycle has become less a symbol of the “Hell’s Angels”
subculture and more a sign of youthful vitality, individualism, and personal freedom
now appropriated by wealthy enthusiasts and collectors.
The photograph of Michael Stich projects these cultural referents on several levels.
Obviously it addresses audiences who identify Stich as a young, successful tennis star,
but it also links the images of youthfulness, vitality, and strength (associated with
sports) with the power, speed, and freedom provided by the motorcycle. Success is the
glue that bonds these two dimensions (sports and mobility) in the advertisement. The
physical prowess of the “athlete as sport star” is a commodity that can be transformed

Figure 4.2. Michael Stich and American Express: sports, motorcycles, and upward mobility.
112 Sponsoring Lifestyle

into economic capital and celebrity status. The motorcycle embodies the corporate
image of the entrepreneur as a rugged individualist (loner) who dares to stray from the
paved road in order to explore new vistas and who in doing so achieves financial re-
wards and privilege. (Terms such as “venture capital” are clearly related to this concept
of risk taking.)
Mobility also represents economic mobility. The athlete’s physical strength, mental
focus, and financial success converge. The hidden dream of young, male entrepre-
neurs—to become successful sports figures who can jump on the motorcycle and just
“get away from it all”—is a potent image that is by no means limited to the cultural
context of Germany. In the United States, the freewheeling entrepreneur-publisher
Malcolm Forbes was known for his passion for Harley-Davidson motorcycles, which
he frequently rode with his friend Elizabeth Taylor.14 In Germany, Harleys have also
become the toys of successful entrepreneurs and managers, who embrace them as a
symbol of individuality and privilege. As a signifier of popular culture, the motorcycle
has also become a postmodern symbol for mediating contemporary experience and
identity. This was illustrated by the Guggenheim Museum’s description of the motor-
cycle’s cultural role in its exhibition The Art of the Motorcycle, sponsored by BMW:
“More than speed, it embodies the abstract themes of rebellion, progress, freedom,
sex, and danger.”15
The Michael Stich “Portrait” provides an ideal medium for American Express to
address both a younger audience of potential customers (in their twenties and thirties)
and new or existing cardholders who may be somewhat older (in their forties) but
who strongly identify with the projections of youthfulness, mobility, and exclusivity
offered by American Express. I would suggest that the audience for the Stich “Por-
trait” corresponds to a social milieu that Schulze characterizes by its desire for self-
fulfillment (Selbstverwirklichungsmilieu). This milieu constructs its identity on the
borders of diverse forms of cultural expression: “between Mozart and rock music, art
exhibitions and movies, contemplation and action, anti-barbaric and anti-conventional
distinction” (Schulze 1992, 312, 318). For Schulze, this well-educated milieu’s mobility
emanates from the centrality of the student lifestyle (travel, cafés, bars, bistros, con-
certs, sports) as a dominant factor constructing identity in later professional life. Even
among professions characterized by conformity (e.g., managers and engineers), the
creation of a distinctive professional identity based on self-fulfillment has become
more apparent: “The desire for originality leads to a receptivity to new signs, be they
in fashion, sports, styles of music, manners of speech, or points of view” (Schulze
1992, 312–13). The internal segmentation of this milieu accounts for what may seem to
be surface contradictions of seemingly disparate groups, that is, yuppies; those who
want to get ahead in the world and those who have dropped out of professions; con-
sumer addicts and those who shun consumerism (Schulze 1992, 312). What character-
izes all of these submilieus is their common orientation toward self-fulfillment, to-
ward pursuing an objective “Because I want it this way” (312). For this milieu, “The
highest authority is the subject itself ” (319). Authority figures and rigid hierarchies are
 Sponsoring Lifestyle 113

viewed with skepticism. Thus, American Express developed its new Blue Credit Card
in order to reach
a new wave of young consumers who are not prepared to sacrifice personal life for
work—“work to live,” not “live to work” is their motto. American Express indicates
that this shift in consumer attitudes is changing the behavior and spending habits of 23
to 35 year-olds. Fifteen years ago these attitudes were held by only one-quarter of the
population, but the research indicates that this will grow to 50 percent within the next
20 years.16

The Stich advertisement seems to address a significant segment of the members of this
milieu, who are younger (under forty), perceive themselves as belonging to the upper-
middle class or upper class, and are “upwardly mobile” (Schulze 1992, 320). Perhaps
they fit the stereotype of the “yuppie”; however, they do not wish to be perceived as
such and attempt to assert their individuality professionally as well as personally.
Mobility and individuality formed the basis of student existence, which young
professionals now utilize as a form of orientation in order to structure identities.
Certainly the “Portraits” advertisements project the image of celebrities who are ac-
tive, successful nonconformists, both professionally and personally. Moreover, they
respond to a sociopsychological orientation that Schulze identifies as paradigmatic for
many younger Germans—that of the artist:
Within the myth of the artist . . . the traditional components of mastery and privileged
participation in the sublime have largely disappeared. . . . Both ordering principles had
to become obsolete to the degree that the artist became the ultimate projection of the
idea of self-fulfillment. The artist is the primary performer of his/her own subjectivi-
ty. . . . This milieu imagines the artist as someone who “works damned hard on himself
or herself,” frequently in solitude, but always unwaveringly dedicated to oneself. Cer-
tainly, the breakthrough to this self-fulfillment represents the paradigmatic experience
of this milieu. (1992, 317)

The lifestyle of the artist is indeed a powerful myth used in cultural promotion. In
the 1990s, 20 percent of young Germans between the ages of sixteen and twenty-four
selected the artist as an ideal form of existence and ranked it as the most desirable pro-
fession; professional athlete was ranked second.17 Images of the artist have also been
adapted to contemporary corporate culture, where artists are reconfigured as artist-
entrepreneurs and linked to the creativity of new product innovation (see chapter 2).

Wim Wenders
Mobility (as a product) becomes a lifestyle and mode of experience that allows the in-
dividual to actualize self-fulfillment. Whereas the photograph of Michael Stich con-
structs self-fulfillment in terms of the physical power (of sports) and technological
power (of mobility), Leibovitz’s “Portrait” of director Wim Wenders also employs mo-
bility (as a life-defining experience), in this instance to represent the contemporary
 Sponsoring Lifestyle 115

artist. For it is the film director who epitomizes the allure of the artist in postmodern
culture, promising to combine the popular with the avant-garde.
In the first of two advertisements, Wenders is relaxing in the driver’s seat of his vin-
tage Citroen. American Express explains that Wenders, “who has a weakness for classic
cars, drove a so-called ‘gangster car’ even as a student at the Munich Film School.”18
Again the student experience forms the basis for lifestyle orientation defined by mo-
bility, and the automobile facilitates self-fulfilment as the site and source of creativity:
“This famous Citroen also provided the framework for the first concept photo that
Annie Leibovitz photographed of Wim Wenders. The automobile as the site of relaxa-
tion and inspiration: many of his ideas for films and screen plays originated on the
road in the automobile.”19
Travel as a signifier of artistic creativity is projected in a second photograph of
Wenders shot in Berlin, where he stands in the no-man’s-land of the former “Death
Strip” with a remnant of the Berlin Wall to his right and the Reichstag in the back-
ground. American Express points out that this is a site similar to those chosen by
Wenders for the 1987 movie Wings of Desire (Der Himmel über Berlin).20 Initially, the
sociohistorical context of Berlin, as the actual site of the photograph, is subordinated
to the promotional image of the director and his film. American Express utilizes the
international recognition of the film and the director as a filter for experiencing the
city. We may not have experienced Berlin firsthand, but we have seen Wings of Desire.
We can travel to Berlin to stand, like Wenders, and envision the film that we have seen.
The advertisement links associations of the city of Berlin as a travel destination with
the experience of cinema as a commodity. Wenders’s persona as a successful director
provides a thematic point of departure for associations revolving around Berlin as a des-
tination, which can of course be experienced by using the American Express Card.
Beyond representations of “cultural tourism,” however, the Wenders advertisement
also functions in the realm of corporate and public cultural politics. Berlin, the
Reichstag, and the graffiti-covered Wall are not incidental props. They provide the con-
text for the presentation of a German national identity (in the new capital), an identity
that is linked with the introspective creativity of one of the nation’s most prominent
filmmakers who, framed by the symbols of German history past and present, gazes up
into a rather stormy sky. Whether the clouds on the horizon link “the heaven over
Berlin” with the turbulence of postunification Germany or simply with the “stormy
temperament and introspection of the artist” is not significant within the discursive
structure of the advertisement, which tells us that introspection and self-confidence are
not mutually exclusive—in defining either the artist’s persona or national identity. The
successful artist, posed between the Reichstag and the Wall, provides a marketable
image for the promotion of a new national orientation. Standing at the intersection of
culture, national identity, and commerce, Wenders becomes a promotional icon for
postunification Germany—introspective, creative, contemporary, and self-confident.

Figure 4.3. Wim Wenders and American Express: artists, lifestyles, and consumption.
 Sponsoring Lifestyle 117

By centering the artist between the Wall and the Reichstag, rather than examining
the triangulation of the forces embedded in these three images (i.e., the relations be-
tween contemporary cultural production and representations of German history and
identity), cultural politics takes a depoliticized turn. Whereas artists such as Christo
and Jeanne-Claude or Hans Haacke interrogated notions of German history and
identity during the 1990s by problematizing the sites and contexts of their representa-
tion, the American Express advertisement foregrounds the mythical persona of the
artist as the new Germany. In this scenario, both the Reichstag and the Wall are aes-
theticized through the work of the artist and can be comfortably relegated to the visu-
al background (provided by the Reichstag) as “past” (history). Even more than the
artist’s work, it was the image of the artistic persona itself as a convenient packaging
for self-fulfilment that provided the foundation for a depoliticized cultural politics of
consumerism. Understood both as corporate cultural politics and the cultural politics
of postunification Germany, this image was also consonant with the “Bonn Re-
public’s” politics of “no experiments” that attempted to defuse rather than engage cul-
tural conflict. In the context of the Wenders “Portrait,” shot in 1992, Germany is re-
configured within the artistic modalities of dynamism, creativity, individuality—all of
which conformed with images of creative entrepreneurship and the Kohl govern-
ment’s articulation of a cultural politics defined as “Corporate Germany.”
Yet viewers who are familiar with Wenders’s work and look past the surface-level
projections of persona (as well as the Wall and the Reichstag as props) are confronted
with a paradox replicated in the director’s own work. Although the notions of travel
and mobility explored in many of Wenders’s road movies, such as The American
Friend, Kings of the Road, and Paris Texas, or within the broader contexts of Wings of
Desire or Until the End of the World reject the certainty and security of final destina-
tions (such as those offered by cultural tourism), they invoke contemporary myths
about the search for destinations, even if such destinations are sometimes empty or il-
lusory. Robert Kolker and Peter Beicken conclude that the search for the metaphorical
road is confronted with the longing for love and stability:
Wenders attempts to account for Germany’s appalling past by exploring the cultural
and personal lacunae in its present, by using restlessness and motion as a metaphor for
the inability to stay still and remember. . . .
Wenders gives up the angelic freedom of the wanderer for the flesh and blood of the
lover and expresses a sudden fear of the complex, articulate image of the road. In doing
so, he comes home to the banality of the unsurprising and undesiring. Love as Heimat
[Home] is created by a desire that is superior to the forces that forever oppress the ordi-
nary. (1993, 165, 166)

To the extent that viewers bring their own experiences with Wenders’s films to their
viewing of the advertisement, such conflicts also become apparent within the visual

Figure 4.4. Wim Wenders at the Berlin Wall with the Reichstag in the background: cultural capital and the new “capital
of culture.”
118 Sponsoring Lifestyle

discourse of the photograph. Ultimately, this narrative does not point to mobility as
the actualization of self-fulfilment (through travel as an accumulation of cultural capi-
tal); rather, it evokes a realization that travel in a postmodern, global culture has itself
become meaningless. In this sense, Leibovitz’s photograph integrates this aspect of
Wenders’s work in the 1990s by juxtapositioning the uncertainty of the road with the
security of Heimat (the depoliticized political culture of Kohl’s postunification Ger-
many). And it is precisely that uncertainty that the corporation promises to overcome.

Hanna Schygulla/Maria Braun: The American Express Card—Don’t Leave Heimat without It
The images of travel and mobility, freedom, individualism, and creativity projected in
the photographs of Stich and Wenders are also embedded in one of Leibovitz’s most
successful photographs for American Express in Germany: Hanna Schygulla as Maria
Braun.21 Schygulla’s “reprise” of her role in Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s The Marriage
of Maria Braun (Die Ehe der Maria Braun) (1979) for an American Express advertise-
ment raises issues of ambiguity and identity in postmodern photography, issues that
are also present to greater or lesser degrees in much of Leibovitz’s portrait photogra-
phy during the 1980s and1990s.
As forms of postmodern self-parody, many of Liebovitz’s photographs are doubly
coded as statements of unconventional, individual, narcissistic, or artistic identities
(e.g., actress Marianne Sägebrecht as Venus) and as promotional signs. The hip, post-
modern film enthusiast (Kellner 1995, 254) might be amused by the thought of Wim
Wenders wandering through Berlin like a character in his film The Wings of Desire, or
by the notion of Hanna Schygulla posing as Maria Braun in an American Express ad-
vertisement. Nonetheless, the fact that director (Wenders) and actor (Schygulla) can si-
multaneously assume and reproduce the identities of artist and promoter (for Ameri-
can Express) is very much a part of the postmodern fragmentation of identity, of a
sense of role-playing (Kellner 1995, 258–60).
Schygulla, posed as Maria Braun in the middle of railroad tracks dissolving into
the horizon, seems to address existing or potential cardholders through the overt ref-
erence to Fassbinder’s movie and, by implication, to its social critique. Yet the adver-
tisement allows the viewer to “have it both ways” by participating in the role-playing
represented in the photograph, that is, assuming positions projected by Schygulla (for
American Express) and/or Maria Braun. Images of identity and lifestyle inscribed in
the “Portraits” advertisements reinforce multiple modes of existence that can be actu-
alized through consumption.
Indeed, identity and consumption are central themes in Fassbinder’s Maria Braun,
themes that are recirculated in the symbolic structure of the advertisement.22 Maria
Braun with an American Express Card is, of course, true to type, and we can certainly
imagine her as a cardholder. However, in a key scene of the film, Maria explains to the
company accountant, Senkenberg, how she can represent management positions during

Figure 4.5. Hanna Schygulla as Maria Braun: two American Express cardholders.
120 Sponsoring Lifestyle

labor negotiations but afterward laugh and joke with the chief labor negotiator, who
happens to also be her brother-in-law: “Because I am a master of deceit. A capitalist
tool by day, and by night an agent of the proletarian masses. The Mata Hari of the
Economic Miracle!” (Rheuban 1986, 110). Maria Braun as the Mata Hari of Germany’s
Economic Miracle presents a much more complex and ambiguous image of the suc-
cessful businesswoman than one might expect to encounter in an American Express
advertisement.23
The Mata Hari metaphor links sexual, political, and economic subversion. The
character Maria both attempts to structure identity by separating the various roles she
chooses to play but also painfully recognizes that sex, politics, and economics cannot
be divorced from one another. The factory owner, Oswald, is both Maria’s employer
and lover. Although he holds the economic power of capital that Maria desires, he ulti-
mately develops a psychological dependence upon Maria. Early in their relationship,
Oswald cannot comprehend why Maria wants to be treated as an employee during the
day but can assume the identity of his lover after hours. She instructs him in the nature
of this relationship: “Last night I was the Maria Braun who wanted to sleep with you.
Today I’m the Maria Braun who would like to work for you” (Rheuban 1986, 106).
Maria Braun is clearly a metaphor and allegorical figure for the representation
of Germany’s Economic Miracle (Elsaesser 1989, 270). In Fassbinder’s narrative, how-
ever, the pursuit of economic happiness, of realizing the myth of the “miracle,” is also
linked to the historical experience of fascism and ultimately to self-destruction
(Elsaesser 1989, 267). The explosion of Maria’s new home (the embodiment of the
post–World War II middle-class dream) and her own demise in it represent the cumu-
lative psychological damage in her own life and her failure to somehow manage the
fragmentation of her identity. Maria’s attempts to negotiate her multiple identities as
“wife”—and her fantasy of an ideal marriage with her husband, Hermann, who ac-
cepts a jail sentence for Maria and then leaves for Canada upon his release (having
been “bought” by Oswald)—businesswoman, mistress, and daughter seem to be
doomed from the start, for they reflect and internalize the larger social and psychologi-
cal fragmentation and repression of the past in post–World War II Germany.
If we return to Hanna Schygulla’s portrayal of Maria Braun in the American Ex-
press advertisement, it seems unlikely that the disastrous consequences of the culture
and politics of consumption that are so graphically represented in Fassbinder’s film
were intended in the conceptual development of the advertisement. Nonetheless, the
film provides the thematic focus for the advertisement. Schygulla assumes the persona
of Maria Braun, including the visual references to the film represented by Maria’s
clothing and the railroad tracks. Schygulla as Maria, in her black lingerie and leather
coat, standing in the middle of the tracks, evokes a sense of artificial, staged eroticism
and vulnerability—a quality of intentional artificiality and irony that Leibovitz con-
sciously employs in many photographs to parody the celebrity image.24
The focus on the body as the primary site for the projection of the celebrity image
is an intrinsic component of Leibovitz’s portraiture. Images of romance and adventure
 Sponsoring Lifestyle 121

in the representation of Maria are fused with the notion of train travel as a signifier of
mobility in the “Portrait” advertisements. However, the train is an obvious reference
to the site of Maria’s first encounter with the industrialist Oswald, which leads to her
subsequent financial success. Distinctions between the image of Hanna Schygulla and
that of Maria Braun are blurred and become one within the advertisement. Hanna
Schygulla not only portrays Maria Braun, she is Maria Braun. In this sense, it is Maria
Braun who stands in front of the camera for American Express. Schygulla’s endorse-
ment of the American Express card is simply another role. Both the professional ac-
tress (clearly recognizable to the German audience as Hanna Schygulla) and the fic-
tional Maria Braun master the art of assuming identities.
The ambiguity of the multiply coded photograph, inscribed with contradictory
messages, is characteristic of contemporary advertising practice. In his discussion of
cigarette advertising, Kellner concludes,
One of the features of contemporary culture is precisely the fragmentation, transitori-
ness, and multiplicity of images, which refuse to crystalize into a stable image culture.
Thus, the advertising and cultural industries draw on modern and postmodern strate-
gies, and on traditional, modern, and postmodern themes and iconography. (1995, 255)

In some respects, the associative structure of the Hanna Schygulla/Maria Braun “Por-
trait” may be similar to cigarette ads, which promise fulfillment and yet, taken to their
logical conclusion, also imply self-destruction.25 The rupture between family, home,
and place in Maria Braun is graphically portrayed in the final scene of self-destruction
resulting from the gas explosion that results from her attempt to light a cigarette.
Fassbinder linked the destruction of Maria’s new house (which she attempted to
make into her own “home”/Heimat) to Germany’s postwar history by running por-
traits of the FRG’s chancellors (with the exception of Willy Brandt) as a background
to the credits. Simultaneously, the hysterical voice track of a sports reporter (on a radio
broadcast) declares “Germany is World Champion! [Weltmeister]” against Hungary—
affirming a new national self-confidence. Thus, the advertisement’s fusion of Schygulla
with Maria Braun actually undermines travel understood as the security of home and a
stable identity.26 Paradoxically, the advertisement can only be successful to the extent
that the viewer recognizes Schygulla as Maria Braun, but this association also poten-
tially evokes the finality of Maria’s demise at the end of the film, which leaves a lasting
impression in the mind of the viewer.

Postmodern Photography and Identity

As we have seen, the intersection of photography, advertising, and the museum con-
stitute pivotal components of the institutional and discursive structure of the sponsor-
ship of the “Portraits” promotion and the Photographs exhibition. At this point, I
would like to return to the discussion of the mediation of photography, both as art
and advertising, in order to situate Leibovitz’s work more precisely within the context
of postmodern photographic practices. In his book On the Museum’s Ruins (1993),
122 Sponsoring Lifestyle

Douglas Crimp delineated the central role of photography in “theorizing a shift from
modernism to postmodernism” (15). Crimp argues that the evolution of the photo-
graphic medium represents a “watershed between modernism and postmodernism”
that can be traced as a series of phenomena, including
(1) the reclassification of photography as ipso facto an art form and its consequent
“museumization,” (2) the threat posed by photography’s reclassification to the tradi-
tional modernist mediums and to the aesthetic theories that underwrite their primacy,
and (3) the advent of new photographic practices that refuse the tenets of authorship
and authenticity upon which photography is newly comprehended. (15)

In Photographs, 1970–1990, we see the evolution of Leibovitz’s work from the photo-
journalism of the 1960s and early 1970s—which projected culture and politics through
the documentation of the subculture of rock groups in Rolling Stone or through pho-
tographic essays (e.g., on Richard Nixon’s resignation)—to the more self-parodic,
staged style of superficial glamour projected in Vanity Fair.27 Although Leibovitz’s
choice of subjects (media celebrities) did not change dramatically during the 1970s
and 1980s, there was a perceptible shift in aesthetics. Her photography increasingly in-
tegrated approaches that are both modern and postmodern. As one of the most
prominent photographers of the 1980s and 1990s, Leibovitz has contributed to post-
modern photography’s proliferation within upscale print media (Vantity Fair, The
New Yorker). Although Leibovitz’s work profited from the “museumization” of pho-
tography as art, it is unclear to what extent individual works engage a postmodernism
of resistance rather than one of accommodation (Crimp 1993, 14), and I would now
like to investigate these positions more fully.
Annie Leibovitz’s photography, like the work of many other postmodern photog-
raphers, is informed by the development of multimedia artists, in particular Andy
Warhol, who adapted Marcel Duchamp’s concept of the ready-mades by utilizing the
technological potential of reproduction inherent in the all-pervasive photographic
medium. In this regard, Abigail Solomon-Godeau writes,
Accordingly, when photography began to be incorporated in the art of the 1960s, its
identity as a multiply reproducible mass medium was insistently emphasized, nowhere
more so than in the work of Andy Warhol. Warhol’s exclusive use of already extant
mass imagery, his production of series and multiples, his replication of assembly-line
procedures for the production of images . . . constituted a significant break with mod-
ernist values. (1991, 104)

In a sense, Warhol, along with Rauschenberg, Ruscha, and Johns, was adapting the
ready-made to reexpress the commodification of the object through the postmodern
“already-made” (Solomon-Godeau 1991, 104). Unlike Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Wes-
ton, or Walker Evans, who wanted to maintain the auratic quality of the photograph
as a work of art, postmodern photographers such as Vince Leo, Connie Hatch, and
Martha Rosler were interested in problematizing this tradition, particulary with re-
 Sponsoring Lifestyle 123

spect to institutional or representational critique (Solomon-Godeau 1991, 106). Linda

Hutcheon underscores Barthes’s analysis of photography and fiction (in Roland
Barthes by Roland Barthes, 1977) in delineating a “split between the self-image and the
imaged self ” (Hutcheon 1991, 41).28
Three photographs of Warhol in the Photographs catalog (Leibovitz 1991/92, 50–51)
reflect this process. The first photograph of Warhol (1976) holding his constant com-
panion (the tape recorder),29 under his arm and pointing a camera back at Leibovitz—
the photographer being photographed by the subject—references this split between
the “self-image and the imaged self.” It also attempts to break the facade of photog-
raphy as mirror while recognizing its power of “inscription and construction”
(Hutcheon 1991, 41).30 On the opposite page of the catalog, we see two black-and-
white photographs, one above the other. In both, Warhol (holding his dachshund) is
pictured only on an artist’s canvas. The photographs show the American realist artist
Jamie Wyeth (in Warhol’s studio in New York) working on a painting of Warhol
(Leibovitz 1991/92, 50, 230n; see also Leibovitz 1991). In the top photograph, Wyeth is
painting the canvas, his back is toward the photographer, and Warhol’s image is facing
the viewer/photographer. In the lower photograph, Wyeth has a brush raised to the
canvas and has turned to the viewer/photographer; however, his face is masked with a
black handkerchief. The photographs of Wyeth painting Warhol conceptually tele-
scope the three artists: Leibovitz (as the photographer, unseen but nonetheless present
to the viewer of the photograph), Wyeth (as the masked but present portraitist), and
Warhol (the object of the photographs and Wyeth’s painting).
The triangulation of the three photographs deconstruct the artist and the auratic
quality of the artwork. This is accomplished first by reproducing and “copying” the
process of representation (in two photographs of Wyeth painting Warhol, placed one
above the other). Second, Warhol critiques traditional portraiture (the representation
of the subject), through the parody of posing with his pet, while undermining the
portrait through his surreal “stare” that simultaneously breaks the realist mirror of
portraiture. Wyeth negates the cult of the celebrity painter by turning his back to the
camera (rather than assuming a promotional pose next to the canvas) in the top photo-
graph and by masking his identity in the bottom photograph. The photographs inter-
rogate the identity of the artists (Warhol, Wyeth, and Leibovitz) through self-irony
(Wyeth wearing a mask), parody (Warhol “holding court” with his lapdog), and
anonymity. Posing as the “masked artist” draws attention to the artist rather than to
the subject on the canvas and simultaneously references the cult of the artist in
a mass-media society where the celebrity image cannot, in any case, be concealed. The
viewer’s attention is directed to the presence of the “invisible” photographer (Leibo-
vitz) and the act of photographing (as a process of cultural production and representa-
tion) through the photograph of Warhol pointing his camera at the unseen subject
(the photographer Leibovitz).
Leibovitz’s work in the Photographs catalog, particularly beginning in the mid-
seventies, at once aestheticizes the personal, intimate, and private and yet parodies the
124 Sponsoring Lifestyle

cult of the celebrity. The photographs engage the process of myth making and celebri-
ty, with its attendant notions of power, wealth, fame, and stardom, while simultane-
ously demythologizing the celebrity persona, not only through the explicit self-irony
on the part of the subjects as photographed objects but also as a result of the extensive
and intentional staging or dramatizing of photo sessions.
Leibovitz has commented that these staged situations “frequently have more to do
with what photography really is. Sometimes there is a lot of manipulation in photos
that are supposed to look ‘genuine’” (Sischy 1991/92, 10). The staged quality of much
of this later work directs the viewer’s attention to the medium of photography itself
and to the celebrity persona, as a construct or artifice, and questions the legitimacy of
the “subject as authority,” as, for example, in the representation of conspicuous con-
sumption in the photo of Ivana and Donald Trump in the Plaza Hotel, New York
City (1988) (Leibovitz 1991/92, 175). The use of “deliberate banality” (Hutcheon 1991,
129), as in a photo of Roseanne Barr and Tom Arnold mud wrestling in Malibu, Cali-
fornia (1990) (Leibovitz 1991/92, 204–5), appropriates the body as a prop and com-
modity of media culture while calling attention to mud wrestling as a signifier of the
popular. Other photos, for example, of John Lennon with Yoko Ono (photographed
several hours before his death in New York City) (Leibovitz 1991/92, 116), focus on the
vulnerability of the body rather than its costuming or “packaging”—represented in its
quintessential form in Leibovitz’s photos of an opulent, bejeweled Liberace (Leibovitz
1991/92, 126–27). A photo in which Christo has “wrapped” himself parodies his own
work while representing the body’s commodification (Leibovitz 1991/92, 119). The
body as a literal canvas, for the artist’s work and its use as a site of self-promotion, is
imaged in a photo of artist Keith Haring (Leibovitz 1991/92, 162–63).31
Theorists of postmodern photography (e.g., Benjamin Buchloh, Douglas Crimp,
Rosalind Krauss) have emphasized “its dismantling of reified, idealist conceptions en-
shrined in modernist aesthetics—issues devolving on presence, subjectivity, and aura”
(Solomon-Godeau 1991, 127). Although Leibovitz’s work in Photographs seems to ad-
dress many of the issues of postmodern photography (e.g., questioning representation
in photographic practice, de-centering the subject, recognizing the “constructed”
quality of photography, exploring the relationship between self image and imaged self,
or between photographer and subject), we must inquire to what extent her photo-
graphs operate primarily within the confines of technique and style, without defining
or engaging strategies of opposition.
By the early 1980s, some techniques of postmodern photographic practice (e.g.,
montage and reshooting pages from magazines or directly from television screens) had
become part of a more standardized repertoire. Much of the postmodern photography
displayed in galleries during this period represented a “newly constructed stylistic unity”
that obscured its critical referents without specific, prior knowledge—particularly the
second generation of postmodernist photographers (e.g., Frank Majore, Alan Belcher,
Stephen Frailey), who appropriated media culture (especially advertising) in a more
celebratory fashion, that is, without questioning its “institutional frame” (Solomon-
 Sponsoring Lifestyle 125

Godeau 1991, 135). The potential to critically engage institutional contexts of cultural
production became crucial in defining strategies of a more critical or oppositional
postmodernism:
In the absence of a clearly defined oppositional sphere and the extreme rarity of col-
laborative practice, attempts to clarify the nature of critical practice must focus on the
artwork’s ability to question, to contest, or to denaturalize the very terms in which it’s
produced, received, and circulated. What is at stake is thus not an ethics or a moral po-
sition but the very possibility of a critical practice within the terms of art discourse.
And, as a fundamental condition of possibility, critical practices must constantly ad-
dress those economic and discursive forces that perpetually threaten to eradicate their
critical difference. (Solomon-Godeau 1991, 134)

The potential to define positions and aesthetics of opposition with respect to the
institutions of cultural production is obviously of central importance, not only with
regard to the specific relationship between Annie Leibovitz and American Express but
also in terms of a more generalized analysis of corporate sponsors and artists as entre-
preneurs. We must indeed question the extent to which artistic projects or individual
works, like Leibovitz’s, that function in collaborative modes (e.g., advertising, spon-
sorships) hold the potential for even tentative forms of opposition.
Leibovitz’s photograph of Hanna Schygulla illustrates that the potential reception
of postmodern advertising is by no means unambiguous and cannot be easily reduced
to a typology of manipulative strategies. Moreover, the context of reception and the
audience are key factors that ultimately codetermine the potential for the formation
and mediation of oppositional practice. Precisely because postmodern strategies are
engaged simultaneously in “complicity and critique” (Hutcheon 1991), there is also
the possibility for widely divergent forms of reception in terms of the complicitous or
critical functions of cultural production. It is this feature that makes many works of
postmodern culture attractive to sponsors, yet these works may also contain the po-
tential to oppose the instrumentality the sponsor may attempt to impose upon them.
It is the context of the work’s reproduction (e.g., as advertisement, in a museum, as a
public work of art, in an art catalog, as a greeting card) that suggests the relative po-
tential for oppositional practice within a specific site and a particular point in time.
Site-specific works (e.g., by Hans Haacke or Louise Lawler) maintain a degree of for-
mal and aesthetic flexibility in order to address the objects and institutions of cultural
production and simultaneously to involve audiences in a critical reflection of those
processes.
Leibovitz’s photographs for American Express, The Gap, or the National Fluid Milk
Processor Promotion Board (i.e., celebrities photographed with milk mustaches) rely
on a “signature style” characteristic of some postmodernist photographers (Solomon-
Godeau 1991, 146).32 This is also evident among photographers who have done exten-
sive work in advertising (e.g., Richard Avedon or Herb Ritts). Apart from the early
photojournalism for Rolling Stone, most of Leibovitz’s work, for example, for Vanity
126 Sponsoring Lifestyle

Fair, communicates little about its promotional function. Even if one assumes that
the imaged celebrities may be viewed in both critical and celebratory modes, any link
to an institutional context (e.g., the sponsor or the media industry) is represented
through collaboration (e.g., its linkage to the corporate logo) rather than through criti-
cal inquiry.
In an interview in the photography magazine Aperture, Leibovitz explains,
In the advertising work I’ve done, again, no one has told me how to take the picture. I
couldn’t work any other way. Still, I don’t want to underestimate how working for
American Express or the Gap somehow does influence the picture—even though no
one is telling me how to take it. Sometimes my work in Vanity Fair can feel to me more
like advertising than the advertising work does. The cover of the magazine is no longer
to me, a photograph. It’s turned into a cover. . . . You know, there’s a difference. (Melissa
Harris 1993, 12)

Although Leibovitz is aware of the problematic relationship between the photograph

and the advertisement and of the artificiality of attempting to maintain editorial work
and advertising work as separate spheres, with few exceptions, these tensions do not
seem to be addressed in her work during the 1980s. In the 1990s, however, Leibovitz
seemed to turn to more-overt representations of social and political themes.

The Cultural Politics of Place and Identity: Sarajevo, the Gulf War, Las Vegas
During the 1990s, Leibovitz attempted to balance high-gloss, high-profile celebrity
photographs by returning to the black-and-white photography she used in the 1970s,
not in the documentary style of photojournalism associated with her earlier work (e.g.,
politics and rock music published in Rolling Stone) but in art photography based on
modernist aesthetics (emphasizing presence, subjectivity, and aura). The Photographs
catalog conceptually brackets the postmodern celebrity photographs by closing with
the more modernist representations of dancer-artists Mark Morris, Mikhail Barysh-
nikov, and the White Oak Dance Project. This series includes studio studies of danc-
ers, dancing, and the body (as in the nude study of “swimming dancers” shot under-
water).33 The works fall more clearly in the tradition of studio art photography—by
representing individual artistic expression, authenticity, and originality—in contrast
to the glossy, even garish, color of the celebrity shots accentuating the subject’s self-par-
ody and irony and occasionally the subject’s own sense of superficiality. Clearly, both
modern and postmodern aesthetics are employed as strategies of representation in
Leibovitz’s works during the early 1990s. More significant, however, is a shifting em-
phasis of techniques and approaches that seem to be employed in an attempt to bal-
ance institutional demands (e.g., of sponsors, editors, publishers) with Leibovitz’s own
interests and projects.
A 1994 profile of Leibovitz in Life magazine, “The Eye of Annie Leibovitz,” seemed
to signal a conscious effort to subtly reposition her own image within the mass media.
The article’s blurb established a major theme of the story: “Her work defined celebrity
 Sponsoring Lifestyle 127

for the ’60s generation. Now she is training her gaze on more serious—and riskier—
subjects” (Van Biema 1994, 46). What is meant by the “more serious and riskier sub-
jects” is explained by Leibovitz as “a dance of sort of getting back to moments when
I feel more . . . involved” (quoted in Van Biema 1994, 54). Her series of photos for an
AIDS campaign appeared in bus shelters in San Francisco, and she spent more time
working with dancers Mikhail Baryshnikov and Mark Morris. Life explains that while
working with Morris and the White Oak Dance Project, “she allotted herself weeks.
The subjects were often unknown, the medium black-and-white, the tone both more
intimate and more experimental. She was happy; she was taking risks again” (Van
Biema 1994, 54).
Yet Leibovitz’s real risk was a trip she took to Sarajevo with Susan Sontag.34 The
Life article links Bosnia to Leibovitz’s earlier work as a photojournalist and her efforts
to balance commercial and artistic projects:
In Bosnia, she discovered, there was no image to manipulate. . . . One day as she turned
left while driving through the bombed-out city, “a mortar went off to the right.” One of
its victims was a boy who had been riding a bicycle. He died in her car, on the way to the
hospital. She made a picture at the scene of the atrocity: the abandoned bike, set off by
the ogre’s brush stroke of the boy’s blood. It was a still life, like the photograph of
Jagger’s wrist 18 years before . . . . But on an infinitely greater scale. (Van Biema 1994, 54)

The following week, Leibovitz returned to Los Angeles to photograph action hero
Sylvester Stallone as The Thinker. 35 The obvious irony of the coincidence of these two
projects, which juxtapose the omnipotence of Sarajevo with the image of a contempla-
tive warrior-as-intellectual Stallone, are not explicitly expressed in the Life article; how-
ever, they are, again, related to Leibovitz’s capacity to accept such contradictions:36
She seems comfortable now with her various levels of seriousness. She says she will re-
turn to Bosnia: “I think I’m hooked. I know the people there now.” Yet there is little
sense that she fears being consumed by her involvement the way she allowed herself to
be when she was 25. (Van Biema 1994, 54)

In the photograph of the boy’s bicycle, reproduced in the Life article along with some
of the well-known celebrity photos, we see very different images of travel and celebri-
ty. Here, mobility, signified by the abandoned bicycle (and blood-stained concrete), is
a function of war rather than of lifestyle and culture as consumption. We see a bicycle
turned over on the concrete, not the aesthetic appeal of a jet plane or a cruise ship
linked to the exoticism of travel. The “celebrity” in this photograph is absent and
anonymous, a victim of the random violence of war. Yet the photograph of the bicycle
is also a commodity that can be bought, sold, and reproduced in the glossy pages of
Life-style magazines and within media culture at large.
Two years earlier (1991–92), Leibovitz had completed a very different series of pho-
tographs on the Gulf War for Vanity Fair, which also granted publication rights to the
German men’s magazine Männer Vogue (February 1992). These photos were much
128 Sponsoring Lifestyle

more in the tradition of the postmodern photography of the 1980s. Even though Life
ascribed the role of photojournalist to her two years later, in an interview with Anja
Schäfer of Männer Vogue, Leibovitz renounced any aspirations to return to documen-
tary journalism.37 Leibovitz rejected media images of the war as a façade, like the ve-
neer of the celebrity persona, and preferred to work on the visible contradictions of
this facade:
During my stay in Lebanon, there was a cease fire one day and I observed how photog-
raphers constructed a battle scene. I think it was at that point in time that I decided
that I preferred, consciously—and for the viewer visibly—to stage photos. I’m no
photojournalist and I don’t make any bones about that. I don’t trust photojournalism
any more.38

The photographs of the “Desert Storm” series presented the narrative of the war
through its celebrity politicians, soldiers, media figures, and artists.39 Like the celebri-
ty “Portraits” of the 1980s, the “Desert Storm” photos are multiply coded. They can be
viewed as jubilant, celebratory images of the “winners”—Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf
grinning, Peter Arnett (media star for CNN) relaxing at pool side with his fiancée—or
as a construction, a facade of artificiality. It is likely that the celebrities preferred the
former interpretation to the latter. One of the imaged celebrities is a Stealth bomber
(F-117-A) accompanied by the following text:
Silent, invisible, and so expensive that it could be made out of pure gold. Its successful
missions have silenced the loudest critics. You just need smart airplanes to drop smart
bombs. And in peace time? Off to Gotham City. Batman is waiting.40

The associations of war and entertainment seem to foreshadow the Sarajevo-Stallone

connection several years later. On the following page, a photograph of a Stealth
bomber pilot, and its accompanying text, also suggest the Hollywood connection to
the film Top Gun:
War is not death. War is not flowing blood. War is not suffering children. War is the
silent Super-Slow Motion Picture of a bomb which is inserted into a ventilation duct.
Joe Bouley is one of the pilots who photographs the Super-TV-Event at the stick of the
flying super weapon. War is clean.41

Although the photos and their texts may be interpreted as polysemic images, operat-
ing simultaneously in the modes of complicitous celebration and critical cynicism, it
is questionable to what extent the photos themselves evoke or engage responses rather
than simply providing a validation for, rather than challenging, existing viewer posi-
tions.42 I suggest that when viewer positions are extremely polarized by ideology, as in
this case, postmodernist strategies of appropriating structures of dominance and rep-
resentation in order to reveal their contradictions are largely ineffective. In essence,
each viewer takes from the photograph what he or she wants rather than recognizing
such internal tensions and contradictions. The photographs offer a range of images
from which viewers may choose. With regard to reception, Victor Burgin observes,
 Sponsoring Lifestyle 129

A fact of primary social importance is that the photograph is a place of work, a struc-
tured and structuring space within which the reader deploys, and is deployed by, what
codes he or she is familiar with in order to make sense. Photography is one signifying
system among others in society which produces the ideological subject in the same
movement in which they “communicate” their ostensible “contents.” (1986, 153)

Viewers may wish to identify with the victorious allied troops, their generals, or na-
tions; with the Kuwaitis; with Peter Arnett, the CNN reporter who provided an inter-
view with Saddam Hussein; with violinist Isaac Stern, who continued playing at a
concert during a bombing raid in Israel; or with the authors of the sarcastic and black-
ly humorous accompanying texts and editorials that intend to subvert the facade of
the pictures. In this context, the viewers’ identification is not so much linked to a spe-
cific personality as it is to the image of what they believe the celebrity and photograph
are supposed to represent:
Rather than constructing something like a subject or interpellating individuals to iden-
tify themselves as subjects, media culture tends to construct identities and subject posi-
tions, inviting individuals to identify with very specific figures, images, or positions,
such as the Marlboro man, the Virginia Slims woman, a soap opera mother, or a
Madonna.
Yet postmodern claims concerning the complete dissolution of the subject in con-
temporary culture seem exaggerated. Rather, it seems that media culture continues to
provide images, discourses, narratives, and spectacles that produce pleasures, identities,
and subject positions that people appropriate. (Kellner 1995, 259)

Like the “Portraits” advertisement of Wim Wenders in Berlin, the “Gulf War” celebri-
ties offer a series of images linking personal and national identities. It is the very real
sense of place at that given moment that also functions as both symbol and index.43
Thus, the viewer defines the relationship between Wim Wenders and the Berlin Wall
with respect to Germany, between CNN reporter Peter Arnett and his controversial
interviews from Baghdad conducted with “the enemy” Saddam Hussein with respect
to “patriotism” and “loyalty,”44 or between the combatants, the site of combat in the
Kuwaiti desert, and “Desert Storm” as a signifier of national identity. In this case,
“Desert Storm” becomes a radical signifier of both mobility and war, asserting the
dominance of (occupying) space over time.
The intersection of identity and place is also reflected in “Showgirls,” a “Portfolio
by Annie Leibovitz” (text by Stephen Schiff ) for The New Yorker.45 Alternating color
and black-and-white photos of four Las Vegas showgirls—in full costume on one page
and in their “everyday” dress on consecutive opposing pages—the series juxtaposes
notions of illusion and reality within the context of a city that has become a paradig-
matic representation of postmodern culture. Which photo represents the illusion,
which the reality? Are they really everyday women, or does their dual identity make
them extraordinary? The article emphasizes their ability to move between these iden-
tities, between those of exotic showgirl and mother; those of wife and working
130 Sponsoring Lifestyle

woman. For the audiences, the image of the showgirl is not considered sleazy or
taboo. It has merged with corporate entertainment and Las Vegas to achieve a new le-
gitimacy. Las Vegas has been reimaged and has “transformed itself from Sin City to a
kind of Slot Machine Disneyland” (Schiff 1996, 69). Entertainment conglomerates,
such as Disney and MGM, have established Las Vegas as a legitimate site for family
vacations. The new identity of the showgirl as a sort of “renaissance woman” con-
verges with corporate projections of a new Las Vegas:
Alma, who is Dutch, is familiar to Las Vegas habitués, because her likeness adorns the
tail of one of Western Pacific’s airplanes, and billboards all over town proclaim her “A
Showgirl for the 21st Century.” Alma speaks five languages, takes correspondence
courses in Dutch law, and is married to a film professor at the University of Nevada;
she starred in his most recent short film. (Schiff 1996, 69)

As Schiff implies, part of the attraction of Las Vegas lies in the entertainment in-
dustry’s preoccupation with promoting the romance and nostalgia of Las Vegas’s for-
bidden past while conceptually reinventing the city as a nonthreatening, legitimate
venue for culture. Indeed, it is a place where the viewer and audience may, as at a
theme park, select what they find appealing. Showgirl Linda Green frequently sees
this nostalgic romanticism in her audiences: “I wear these big white feathers at the
end. . . . And I look at people and they’re looking up at me, and I see tears in their eyes
sometimes. The way it’s lit and sparkly—they’re looking at me like I’m this brilliant
white angel” (Schiff 1996, 69).
A letter to the editor of The New Yorker reveals a different perspective on “Show-
girls.” The writer explains that the photos provided an opportunity to discuss notions
of “illusion/truth” with her daughter after her son had received a copy of the annual
swimsuit models in Sports Illustrated:
Later, when my twelve-year-old daughter was looking through Sports Illustrated, I told
her, “you know, many of those photographs are just an illusion. I’d like to show you
what real women look like.” Leibovitz’s photographs gave me an opportunity to talk
over some important issues about beauty, illusion, and self worth with my daughter.46

The “Showgirls” portfolio was integrated into a book collaboration, Women (1999),
with Susan Sontag, who had suggested a larger project focusing on women (both
celebrities and “average” women) in everyday contexts (Goldstein 1999, 1).47 For
Leibovitz, the “Showgirls” are among her most successful photographs—an approach
she developed at the very end of the project and one she believes she would use more
extensively if she were doing the book again. Leibovitz emphasizes their resonance
with the public after their publication in The New Yorker and in particular the fact that
they seem to convey a sense of empowerment (Goldstein 1999, 2). I believe Leibovitz
means empowerment in the sense that the women can control or create their own stage
presence or aura. However, I would ask what the context of the Las Vegas casino con-
veys about the nature of their work and the workplace itself, and whether it under-
 Sponsoring Lifestyle 131

mines this notion of empowerment? Leibovitz’s reading of the casino context is, I
think, a very postmodern one, which many of the show’s teary-eyed spectators would
not share. It is important to distinguish between the reception of the showgirls as per-
formers in the actual context of the casino and the photographs, which (through the
juxtaposition of the photos in their dual roles) present a dynamic tension between the
identities the women assume. Moreover, the readership of The New Yorker is in many
instances a very different audience than the spectators at the Las Vegas shows.
As Kellner observes, “Personal identity is thus fraught with contradictions and ten-
sions” (1995, 258). The images in Annie Leibovitz’s more recent photographs may well
represent attempts to make the viewer conscious of these tensions, but they can also
function as a way of resolving them or of creating new forms of mystification. In any
case, I would like to reemphasize that the actualization of these images, or their recon-
struction by the viewer, cannot be limited to binary oppositions (e.g., illusion versus
reality)—although the construction of some images (such as the “Desert Storm” pho-
tographs) seem to create more-polarized viewer positions than others—rather, they
elicit a spectrum of potential interpretations.
A sense of place and context assumes a key position in the anticipated reception of
the photographs and in structuring their actual reception in museums, in galleries, in
the editorial content of magazines, or as advertisements. How the site (a motorcycle
repair shop, the Berlin Wall, a street in Sarajevo, a Las Vegas casino) is incorporated
into the discursive structure of the photograph and linked with personal or national
identity is crucial to Leibovitz’s own vision of her photographs as intentionally staged
constructs that question the notion of a seamless, documentary, photojournalistic re-
ality. By foregrounding the site as an integral component of constructing or destabiliz-
ing identity, she expands the potential for symbolic associations that engage the imag-
ination of the viewer, regardless of whether this occurs within the context of the
advertisement or of art photography. In some instances, for example, the photograph
of Hanna Schygulla, these associations may at least tentatively subvert or undermine
the actual promotional message of the advertisement. Although this is probably not
an intentional strategy employed as institutional critique, it nonetheless reveals the
paradoxes of corporate promotion, which increasingly attempts to instrumentalize in-
tertextual cultural references. Though these decontextualized references (e.g., Maria
Braun promoting American Express) attract the attention of the viewer through their
unexpectedness, they may also signal the paradoxes and dissonances embedded in the
promotional message, as well as the reconfigured photograph or text. In their media-
tion of cultural production, sponsors attempt to mobilize the polysemic dimensions
of culture and recontextualize them with the corporation’s own site-specific referents.
In chapter 5, we will see that by organizing and structuring the actual sites of cultural
production and reception, corporations attempt to frame or channel the modalities of
this communication. And it is at these selected sites, at events, that the sponsor can di-
rectly, physically, engage artists and audiences through culture.
 5. Sponsoring Events: Culture as
Corporate Stage, from Woodstock
to Ravestock and Reichstock

I would like to begin and end this discussion with two examples of events that were
not sponsored and that were represented in the media as expressions of resistance to or
subversion of commodified culture: Woodstock and Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s
Wrapped Reichstag.1 We might consider the temporal and spatial distance between
Woodstock and the Wrapped Reichstag not simply as beginning or ending points but,
rather, as markers that can assist us in an analysis of the event within postindustrial so-
cieties and postmodern culture. Both Woodstock and the Wrapped Reichstag became
reference points and signifiers of culture and politics, albeit in different cultural and
historical contexts.
In his definition of architecture “as the combination of spaces, events, and move-
ments without any hierarchy or precedence among these concepts,” Bernard Tschumi
traces the “insertion” of the event, as a notion central to the social practice of architec-
ture, to the sociopolitical demonstrations and actions of the late 1960s, particularly
“les événements” (e.g., street barricades) in Paris, which represented both social events
and social movements (Tschumi 1994, 255). Tschumi refines this notion by adapting
Michel Foucault’s concept of event as “the moment of erosion, collapse, questioning,
or problematization of the very assumptions of the setting within which a drama may
take place—occasioning the chance or possibility of another, different setting.”2 For
Tschumi, Foucault’s event is ultimately a “turning point—not an origin or an end.”
Moreover, Tschumi proposes integrating shock as a critical aspect of the event, which
“in order to be effective in our mediated culture, in our culture of images, must go be-
yond Walter Benjamin’s definition and combine the idea of function or action with that
of image” (257).
Certainly, Woodstock and the Wrapped Reichstag involved various forms of “ero-
sion,” “questioning,” or “problematization” of their respective sites. In the case of
Woodstock, the sense of community that emerged spontaneously as a result of both
the unexpected magnitude of the event and the physical conditions (rain, mud, and
insufficient sanitation and food) was related to its “failure” to function as a planned,
commercial event. Indeed, by most accounts the event itself was a disaster (Espen
1994, 73). Yet the sense of “being there,” of “surviving the event,” of sensory “shock,”

132
 Sponsoring Events 133

along with the feeling of shared participation in the music and audience interaction,
was a cathartic experience for the participants. Not only did Woodstock become a
very different experience than what the media and the participants expected, but it
also had a totally unexpected resonance in terms of its subsequent reception, significa-
tion as an icon of 1960s sociopolitical movements, and commodification as a con-
sumer product (Epsen 1994, 71).
Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s plans to wrap the Berlin Reichstag explored the signi-
fication of its architecture (both as a building and as a monument) and its site (as an
ideologically charged space) from the outset. Manfred Enssle and Bradley Macdonald
discuss Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s project in terms of its challenge to auratic art and
its recontextualization as a museal artefact (1997, 2). They argue that the value of the
Wrapped Reichstag emanated from its power to engage public discourse on German
identity and to subsequently engender what Guy Debord referred to as a “community
of dialogue” (1995, 2). Although the completion of the project was the result of many
years of lobbying on the part of Christo and Jeanne-Claude, the final debate within
the German Parliament and the wrapping as an event must be considered within the
historical context of German unification and the decision to move the capital to
Berlin. Thus, the debate over the wrapping of the Reichstag, the actual process of
wrapping, the viewing of the event (which became a series of mini-events), and the re-
ception in the international media all became a part of larger discussions regarding
national identity and the reformulation of cultural policy.
Although Woodstock may have achieved its initial (historical) significance as a re-
sult of chance or serendipity (Espen 1994, 71)—while the Wrapped Reichstag ques-
tioned the assumptions that the historical symbol represented—both events marked
turning points and became lightning rods for subsequent debates over politics and cul-
ture. Moreover, they were rapidly integrated into the institutions and distribution
channels of media culture as points of reference within media discourse on cultural
politics. Yet neither event was conceived as an overt protest of commodified culture.
Woodstock was planned as a commercial event. It failed and only generated income in
the following years as a result of its subsequent marketing and merchandising.3 Christo
and Jeanne-Claude pointedly rejected corporate sponsorship or merchandising for
their project, preferring to retain a greater degree of control over the site and its signifi-
cation, by coordinating the licensing and marketing (pictures, prints, postcards, etc.)
themselves.4 Recognizing the economic exigencies of cultural production and the diffi-
culties, indeed the impossibility, of financing a project of this magnitude “outside” the
marketplace, they chose to negotiate an economic and artistic path that would grant
them a greater degree of artistic freedom to structure the site of its reception.
Precisely because Woodstock and the Wrapped Reichstag accumulated considerable
cultural capital as signifiers of cultural politics (of their respective eras), they can also
be retrospectively projected as events defined as turning points. Whereas Tschumi
foregrounds events as problematizing the site and questioning their inherent logics, I
would, in addition, suggest that they are multiply coded with respect to their potential
134 Sponsoring Events

to attract, entertain, or stimulate and simultaneously subvert (i.e., challenge the as-
sumptions of the event). In this sense, it is not surprising that Woodstock and the
Wrapped Reichstag may be considered as characteristic of postmodern culture as both
“complicity and critique” (Hutcheon 1991, 11–13). I believe it is this potential to attract
and to simultaneously subvert the basis of that attraction that has made Woodstock
and the Wrapped Reichstag powerful cultural symbols. Tschumi’s elaboration of the
event as shock extending into social action can also be understood within a range of ex-
pressions and responses, that is, its potential for social critique, the use of shock as a
strategy of the entertainment industry, and attempts to undermine or subvert the
shock value of entertainment in postmodern culture by turning it back on itself.5 The
subversive power of the event is expressed both in its potential to offer pscyhophysical
stimulation as entertainment and to question the assumptions of that entertainment
(i.e., the event itself ), and in its potential to employ the event as a medium to create
“communities of dialogue.” Thus, events function within a multidimensional space
characterized by attraction, shock, and subversion.6
I would like to explore the implications of event culture, upon which much of cor-
porate sponsorship is based. The functions of events, within multiple modalities and
discourses, include their aesthetics of visualization and technology; their politics of
structuring, organizing, and defining spaces; their mediation of subculture scenes;
and their potential to stimulate critical discourse and social action. Tschumi and
Enssle and Macdonald trace the aesthetics of those events that define themselves as so-
cial provocation (such as the Wrapped Reichstag) to the Situationists and political ac-
tions of the late 1960s, which attempted to “bring art into the ‘streets,’ thus aestheti-
cally reappropriating the contradictions of everyday life for emancipatory purposes”
(Enssle and Macdonald 1997, 16, 21n47; Tschumi 1994, 255). Although some events,
such as Woodstock, became pivotal cultural symbols as a result of their representation
and circulation within media culture, most events are much shorter-lived and less suc-
cessful in engaging their audiences either in the experience of the event itself or in
forms of critical discourse. Nonetheless, they collectively possess enormous cultural
power through their integral role in societies based on generating new experiences.

The Event as Er-leben

Events form the core of almost every form of cultural sponsorship. Behind the plan-
ning and implementation of corporate sponsorship, there is usually an event, orga-
nized to maximize the interaction among its participants: artists or producers, sponsors
and their clients, media markets, and audiences. Sponsors and promotion specialists
have developed the management of events into a science based on various areas of cul-
tural production, including the performing arts (opera, musical, theater, ballet), music
(classical, jazz, rock, pop), visual arts (painting, sculpture, photography, installa-
tions), fiction and nonfiction literature (literary prizes, readings, exhibitions), historic
preservation, and architecture (Roth 1989, 108–9; Schreiber 1994, 66). These areas rep-
resent just a few of the more common sites of cultural production utilized by corporate
 Sponsoring Events 135

sponsors for marketing and communication. Sponsors frequently employ matrices in

order to coordinate their communications objectives (i.e., marketing, sales, promo-
tion, etc.) with their perceived image of a particular cultural event, for example, an art
exhibition in a museum (Bruhn 1991, 243). Some of the “image characteristics” as-
signed to various areas of cultural production include atmosphere, modernity, aesthet-
ic appeal, originality, competence, exclusivity, prestige, tradition, responsibility, youth-
fulness, and harmony (Bruhn 1991, 243). For example, whereas photography is linked
to modernity, originality, and exclusivity, ballet is associated with atmosphere, aesthetic
appeal, originality, prestige, and harmony. In the initial planning stages, such matrices
are used to match the cultural image characteristics with a corresponding product
image or promotional message. This is all part of what has become known as psycho-
graphics (Wegerhoff 1992b, 52; Schreiber 1994, 66), or more specifically, “lifestyle and
event marketing,” which comprises a central objective of sponsorship—that is, image
transfer.
For sponsors, events are much more effective vehicles for reinforcing images than
are print or media advertising because they capitalize on the specific significance of the
site (e.g., an arts festival) for a particular audience or market. More importantly, events
are interactive. They engage the audience in the performance and reception of cultural
products (e.g., singing and dancing at rock festivals). Anthony Tortorici, a former vice
president for public affairs at Coca-Cola, writes: “Events are inherently active, rather
than passive, on several levels at the same time. And, for a marketing message to be
memorable to consumers today, it has to make that transition. Events are the things
that make that happen” (quoted in Schreiber 1994, 150). For serialized or annual events
(e.g., festivals), sponsors may either try to “buy” the event, in which case their name is
prefixed to the event, or develop their own events under their name or in cooperation
with a nonprofit sponsor. Actually “owning” an event is most common in sports spon-
soring; however, it is also practiced within cultural sponsorships, particularly for music
and cultural festivals or specialized programming (e.g., the Texaco–Metropolitan Opera
International Radio Network) (Schreiber 1994, 97, 146–47).7
For Gerhard Schulze, events play a central role in societies oriented to experiences
(Erlebnisse): “The goal of experiencing [erleben] something forms the centerpiece of a
contemporary [social] rationality based upon the demand for experiences” (1992, 425).
Schulze traces the shift in Germany from a society in which individuals and groups
were primarily concerned with issues of survival and economic or material existence
(Germany’s Economic Miracle of the 1950s) to one in which structuring an enjoyable
life has become predominant (during the 1980s). This does not mean that economics
do not continue to play a significant role in defining social relations. However, Schulze
argues that in advanced, postindustrial societies like Germany, there has been a quali-
tative and quantitative shift in orientations: from an economic semantics (based on the
differentiation between “more” and “less”) to a psychophysical semantics of structur-
ing “experiences” (Erlebnisse). The prefix “Er” (from “ur,” “original”) refers to seminal
experiences, that is, those defining “the original” or authentic experience within life
136 Sponsoring Events

(Leben) and referring both to the act or process of experiencing (i.e., the verb erleben)
and to the state of experiencing (das Erlebnis). Once the basic structures of survival are
in place, the existential task of the individual is to determine how to “experience life,”
or literally live life (Er-leben), by selecting, managing, and interpreting the significa-
tion of experiences (Schulze 1992, 140):
The aesthetics of everyday life are constructed as a relationship between the sign and
the object. Whatever constitutes the object of everyday aesthetic episodes—from The
Moonlight Sonata to auto accessories—appears (from the perspective of the semantic
paradigm) as a sign whose contents are experiences. (Schulze 1992, 96)

The construction of an Erlebnis as both a psychological (cognitive) and physical

(bodily/sensory) process is central to an understanding of the experience and the
event. The individual must translate the objective information of the sign (e.g., the
label on a wine bottle) into his or her own sign system before he or she can react aes-
thetically (e.g., judging the wine to be good or bad) (Schulze 1992, 97). Likewise, the
sign (e.g., “Coca-Cola”) is linked to the expectation of a specific sensory experience
(i.e., how Coca-Cola tastes or the expectation of how it tastes). In this sense, the indi-
vidual can only purchase the offer of the experience or the product, but not the ex-
perience itself. This must be reconstructed each time the “product” is experienced
(Schulze 1992, 548). Schulze foregrounds the significance of the body as the primary
site of experiencing. Even if we are not always aware of it, “aesthetics go through the
body” (106). As the site and medium of “experiencing,” the body has particular im-
plications for events (e.g., rock concerts or events associated with high culture) and
“interactivity.”8
Although the orientation to and search for experiences characterize Western socie-
ties such as Germany, Schulze points out that the symbolic function of events as signi-
fiers of a “philosophy of life,” of the “meaning of existence,” or of social movements
has diminished:
Woodstock is over. Even though the rock concert audiences have become more expres-
sive, the real or imagined ecstasies of the fans are not based on a “meaning of life.” . . .
Enjoyment is the predominant level of meaning: counter-culture has paled, as has the
stimulus of personal involvement mediated through an experience . . . a “philosophy of
life.” . . . Wearing jeans, driving a motorcycle, pop music, open styles of travel and
dance as expression of a world view . . . have been reduced to psychophysical states of
stimulation. . . . normative connotations have faded . . . and been superceded by the
desire to just have a little fun. (1992, 548)

Although clichéd notions of “living life to the fullest” or, as one beer ad in the United
States exhorts, “Grab[bing] all the gusto you can get!” are not new, in the sense that
they project a sybaritic or hedonistic lifestyle, their proliferation and projection into
most spheres of everyday life based on structuring largely commodified, enjoyable ex-
 Sponsoring Events 137

periences characterize some key aspects of both promotional culture (Wernick 1991)
and media culture (Kellner 1995).
Although everyday aesthetic experiences are marked by the disintegration of an ex-
istential component of meaning linked to cultural products, the deterioration of the
normative connotations of aesthetics is particularly apparent within high culture
(Schulze 1992, 546). Participants in high culture rely, with increasing frequency, on
the suggestion of a “deeper significance” (constructed by cultural mediators and audi-
ences alike), while a genuine sense of a worldview (Weltanschauung) related to a cul-
tural production fades (Schulze 1992, 546). In many respects, the defense of local folk
traditions by government-sponsored cultural institutions (e.g., in Bavaria) represents
an attempt to preserve the mythologies of those spaces that the state and commercial
interests were actually destroying through land development policies (e.g., the Franz-
Josef Strauss Airport in Erding near Munich) and the expansion of suburban spaces
around the city. Thus, the meaning of events is also related to their function as a space
for the representation of cultural politics.

Opera as Corporate Stage: The Bregenz Festival

Contemporary events, even those that seemed to be immutable “classics,” such as the
annual production of Wagner’s Ring at Bayreuth, are increasingly subject to the rene-
gotiation of their signification through production, staging, sponsorship, promotion,
and marketing.9 Germany (and the EU in general) has experienced a proliferation of
arts and music festivals since the early 1980s. Relatively new festivals, such as the
Schleswig-Holstein-Musikfestival, launched in 1986, became high-profile vehicles for
local cultural policy (promoting regional tourism) and image promotion of major
German corporations (Lufthansa, Audi, Windsor). Schleswig-Holstein became one of
the most successful, and controversial, of the new event festivals of the 1980s by offer-
ing a mammoth program (more than 227 concerts in 1987) to a mass audience (of
more than 220,000) at competitive prices (DM 35–100 ), and at a variety of sites, in-
cluding some rather unorthodox venues (e.g., in barns).10
As sponsorship specialist Peter Roth concedes, “The whole festival is planned and
constructed like a consumer product” (1989, 250–55). The festival logo unites the
natural setting of rural Schleswig-Holstein (lakes, meadows, roofs, and seascape) with
music (musical notes) signifying both the tourists’ “romantic gaze” (Urry 1995, 191)
and their collective consumption of the event product (music performance). Inexpen-
sive tickets (averaging DM 35) were intended to attract younger audiences to the per-
formances. Promoting high culture for the masses reflected Germany’s regional and
cultural politics of the 1970s, expressed by Hilmar Hoffmann’s slogan “Culture for
everyone” (“Kultur für alle”). This “democratization” of cultural spaces was most no-
tably linked to the cultural politics of expansionist building programs in Germany, for
example, in Frankfurt am Main, under Hoffmann’s aegis (1970–1990), which shifted
the city’s image from that of a sterile banking metropolis (Bankfurt) to that of a re-
gional center for contemporary urban culture (particularly through new museums
138 Sponsoring Events

along the Main River).11 Although the Schleswig-Holstein-Musikfestival had become

the media’s paradigm for marketing regional culture through public and private sup-
port, its overexpansion threatened it with imminent collapse (Roth 1989, 252–53). By
the mid-1990s, Schleswig-Holstein was accumulating debt at the rate of DM 2.5 mil-
lion per annum, less than 60 percent of the seats were being sold, the number of con-
certs had been reduced to 110 for the eight-week season, and in a rather ironic twist,
Franz Willnauer came from the Salzburg Festival (Schleswig-Holstein’s rival in the
south) to become the artistic director.12 Schleswig-Holstein was a highly visible ex-
ample of the cyclical nature of many new festival concepts. Simultaneously, sponsored
promotions touted in the media (e.g., Der Spiegel ) by Schleswig-Holstein’s president,
Björn Engholm, brought the commodification of cultural events into the public con-
sciousness and revealed public culture’s growing dependency upon corporate funding.
The Bregenz Festival in Austria illustrates how the resignification of cultural events
occurs—in terms of both a postmodern tourism of visual consumption (Urry 1995,
139–40) and the insertion of commercial interests into event organization and its aesthetic
mediation. Both of these processes relate to broader issues concerning the corporate
politics of space. Bregenz, as a city and festival site, is strategically located in the so-
called triangle (Dreiländereck) between Switzerland, Austria, and Germany. By attract-
ing audiences from all three markets (up to 6,500 spectators), Bregenz typifies the
emergence of regional cultural marketing within the EU. The recent history of the
festival (which was founded in 1946) is characteristic of international trends for fund-
ing cultural programs in the EU during the 1980s and 1990s. Cuts in government sup-
port for culture increased the festival’s dependency upon sponsorships, fund-raising,
and marketing. A scathing government audit of Bregenz Festival finances in 1981
led not, however, to programmatic cutbacks but to an unprecedented expansion—
including aggressive marketing and promotion—that has continued into the twenty-
first century. Indeed, Bregenz’s management reestablished it as a “premier festival”
event through an “expansive corporate policy” (Feldmann 1992, 81). The festival’s
communications director Bernd Feldmann explains:
Opulent productions on the world’s largest lake-side stage were supposed to make
Bregenz into a focal site of festival offerings during the summer. The new [market] po-
sition took hold. Spectacular productions such as Jerome Savary’s Magic Flute (1985/86)
and his Carmen (1991/92) attracted the public. Bregenz freed itself from its Me-Too-
Image and advanced to one of the leading festivals in Europe. (81)

The new “marketing mix” of opera, theater, and orchestral performances, combined
with the promotion of large-scale events on the floating stage, was so successful that
by 1995 the production of Fidelio had reached a new season-attendance record of
206,490 visitors.13 Bregenz illustrates the institutional convergence of corporate and
nonprofit interests based on the rationales of market demand (Schulze 1992, 510–11),
as well as the integration of corporate marketing and promotion strategies as a basis
for reformulating its mission, objectives, and image from within (defined as corporate
 Sponsoring Events 139

identity). In this respect, Bregenz is characteristic of contemporary arts management

(within museums, symphonies, and festivals) that synthesizes corporate and cultural
interests.
The image of “the stage” represents a metaphor and locus of attraction for the mar-
keting and communication of the Bregenz Festival’s own corporate identity as well as
those of its corporate sponsors and audiences. Unlike Schleswig-Holstein, which
predicated performance on a dispersion and “democratization” of the performance
sites (from barns to castles), Bregenz made the image of the stage and the visual scale of
its productions the preeminent features of its promotion. Indeed, the relationship be-
tween the festival’s image, stage, and production parallels similar strategies of signifi-
cation used by museums to mediate their image, architecture, and contents (Ritchie
1994, 12). New museums employ architecture as a focal point of their communication
efforts (e.g., Frank Gehry’s Guggenheim Museum Bilbao) and then link them to exhi-
bitions. Similarly, Bregenz utilized its architecture, Europe’s “largest lake-side stage,”
in order to communicate the image of the festival and the physical scale of its perfor-
mances. The stage and the opera productions are signified two ways: through visuali-
zation techniques (similar to stunts and special effects utilized in films) and the stage
engineering that supports the production. Feldmann explains:
Expensive stage superstructures require additional and corresponding investments.
The international reputation which Bregenz enjoys was achieved through the courage
to produce spectacular productions on the lake-side stage. The dramaturgical concept
which attempts to enthuse a large segment of the public by presenting a visualization
of the content has been successful. However, this also requires extraordinary efforts.
(1992, 82)

These “extraordinary efforts” include using a stuntman who, in the final scene of The
Flying Dutchman, dives from a thirty-three-meter lighthouse, specially constructed for
the Bregenz production and later moved to Vienna’s Technical Museum. Both the
construction and moving projects were sponsored by the Association of Austria’s
Casinos (Feldmann 1992, 85). The stage set for a similar megaproduction of Carmen
included eighteen-meter mountain walls made from original castings taken in the
Swiss Alps. For Fidelio, a thirty-six-meter high metal wall and forty-five prison cells
were constructed.
The use of dramatic stage effects have become part of the experience (Erlebnis) of
events (from the Rolling Stones rock concerts to Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals to
classical opera) and have shaped audience expectations for live performances. They are
facilitated through sophisticated hardware and software, often provided by the corpo-
rate sponsors in a sort of cultural “technology transfer” of know-how. Technology
links the corporation, the event, and the cultural production not only by creating an
image but also by actually changing the aesthetic mediation of the production itself
and the manner in which it is experienced. The fusion of technological innovation
with the opera as a signifier of artistic creativity facilitates the social legitimation of the
140 Sponsoring Events

corporate sponsors (e.g., Mitsubishi Motors Corp. and Digital Kienzle). In this re-
spect, we can observe an attempt to harmonize the signification of the festival with
corporate image in order to effect an image transfer from festival to sponsor:
Here, sponsors use the possibility of creating a connection to the sympathetic “Fes-
tival” product. In order to achieve this relationship it is, however, necessary to reach an
agreement with respect to the fundamental ideas so that the involvement of the spon-
sor is credible and can produce the image improvement which is desired. (Feldmann
1992, 83)

The second phase of this process involves both technological and image transfer
between the cultural production and corporate sponsor:
The particular challenge of the lake-side stage, which must resist each storm, and there-
fore continually places new and unknown demands on theater technology, is one such
component of the image. Corporate ideas are similar in nature: the urge to produce
new things, the search for better solutions, the courage to lead the way in new tech-
nologies that can be useful to humanity. All of these form the basis of this connection.
(Feldmann 1992, 83)

The image goals of the cultural organization “Festival” and those of the corporate
image become inextricably linked. We can observe how the festival, operating in mar-
keting and promotional modes, accepts the image objectives of the corporation in
order to re-image (or conceptually repackage) its own festival product that is conso-
nant with the corporate image. Once completed, this process facilitates the corpora-
tion’s own re-imaging in order to effect an image transfer between the festival and the
corporation and allows the corporation to operate in its “cultural mode.” The product
festival and the corporate image as product are blurred and merge.
The signification of the festival as a cultural production at a specific place and time
and its functions as a commodity are mediated through a series of relationships
among (1) the stage and the space within the natural environment it occupies on Lake
Constance, creating a background for the stage; (2) the opera production and its
adaptation, which is designed to maximize the stage’s technological potential for dra-
matic effect; and (3) the characteristics of the outdoor stage as a dynamic physical en-
vironment (both natural and meteorological) for the performance. Thus, the stage,
the cultural production, and the environment (the lake and weather conditions) func-
tion as promotional signs within three distinct modes. First, the stage is signified as
the site of technological innovation. This notion is transferred to the image of the
sponsors through their technical support and services. Second, the creativity of artistic
production is associated with corporate innovation. Third, weather conditions (as
dramatic effects) become metaphors for the social and economic “environments” in
which the corporation operates and interacts. Let us now examine examples of these
three dimensions, first for the Bregenz Festival and then for corporate sponsors.
 Sponsoring Events 141

The Festival Image: Stage, Opera, Environment

First, the festival promotes the image of the stage in terms of its extraordinary physical
and technical characteristics (as a “technical wonder”); its dramaturgical aspects and set
designs for specific productions (e.g., the lighthouse in The Flying Dutchman); and its
social function as a privileged site of performance and reception (e.g., the uniqueness
of the event). Second, the image of the cultural production (opera) is related to the crea-
tivity and mastery of the director, actors, cast, and musicians, to the thematic attributes
of the original piece, and to the director’s unique interpretation of the work. Yet the
productions are subordinated to the promotion of opera as an “event” per se, that is,
opera as spectacle. English director David Pountney, who directed The Flying
Dutchman, Nabucco, and Fidelio, remarked that in Bregenz, “there are still real festivals
and not simply any old, interchangeable events, that call themselves that. . . . Here,
people want to have, and should have, their feast for the eyes” (quoted in Umbach 1995,
158). Pountney attempts to engage the audiences on sensory and emotional levels. In
his production of Fidelio, he wants the audience to sense the “sterile idyll” that exists
within the domesticity of their own homes, making couples prisoners to their own iso-
lation, that is, “the loneliness of the individual in today’s affluent society” (quoted in
Umbach 1995, 158).14 Third, the festival instrumentalizes the image of the environment
as a technical effect. The actual backdrop of “real nature” surrounding the stage is sub-
ordinated to the technical effects of “simulated nature” (storms, wind, Swiss Alps) re-
produced on the festival stage. This should be considered within the context of the vi-
sualization strategies (effects), which create new virtual experiences—in part, a result of
expectations audiences bring with them from their interaction with film and television.

The Sponsor’s Image: Stage, Opera, Environment

For corporate sponsors (e.g., Mitsubishi Motors Corp., Digital Kienzle), we can trace
a parallel process of signification. First, the image of the stage represents the innovative
aspects of technology and know-how or technology transfer from the corporate sector
to the cultural sector. In some cases, technical products and services are provided as
part of sponsorship. Digital Kienzle, for example, provided technical assistance in es-
tablishing computerized ticketing and reservation systems (Feldmann 1992, 88). Set
design and technical production are perceived as technical achievements. Part of the
sponsorship package includes an exclusive “behind the scenes” look into the techno-
logical apparatus of the production for “VIPs” (i.e., in order to show how technology
facilitates the staging of culture). Feldmann writes: “The ‘commonality in our intel-
lectual striving’ that is documented through the application and command of new
technologies encouraged the Japanese automobile manufacturer [Mitsubishi] to ‘sup-
port the ambitions of the Bregenz Festival’” (88). The quotation marks intentionally
underscore two key phrases (‘commonality in our intellectual striving’ and ‘support
the ambitions of the Bregenz Festival’), which are employed as discursive strategies to
effect the image transfer between corporation and festival. Through its financial and
142 Sponsoring Events

technological support, the stage is signified as a privileged site of cultural production

in which the corporation also participates.
Second, the sponsor engages the image of the cultural production primarily on the
symbolic level. Special seating, receptions before or after the event, meetings with the
director or performers, lectures, and other “events at the event” are very tangible
measures with symbolic value, designed to create a sense of exclusivity through inter-
action with the performers. More importantly, they create a sense of participation in
the production of culture. VIPs are encouraged to believe that they are “in some small
way making it possible.” Of course, the sponsor also intends that the audience will as-
sociate the range of positive images (e.g., creativity, innovation, exclusivity) with the
corporation and its products. This is reinforced by placing the sponsors’ names on
tickets, in concert programs, in advertisements, and on signs or posters. Feldmann
emphasizes the importance of the festival as a promotional vehicle that can reach an
extensive media market in Austria, Switzerland, and southern Germany. Indeed, the
value of the sponsorship lies not only in the event itself but in its broader signification
in the media as an advertisement, particularly for international corporations that want
to achieve greater image recognition in new markets (Feldmann 1992, 83).
Third, sponsors perceive the image of the environment in both physical and symbol-
ic dimensions. Obviously, the meteorological conditions (rain, sun, heat) on an open-
air stage influence audience predispositions toward the performance and its reception.
More important, however, is the attractiveness of the geography (lake-side stage) and
the privileged cultural site combined with an entertainment package (e.g., reception,
dinner, overnight stay). Environment is defined as an ambience conducive to relaxa-
tion, stimulation, and entertainment. The event provides an opportunity to enhance
the cultural experience through good weather, scenery, food, culture, and shopping
within a corporate “rewards” or promotions program for employees, clients, or valued
customers. As a form of lifestyle sponsoring and cultural tourism, these activities sur-
rounding events are directly related to corporate promotion of travel products (as we
have seen with American Express) as well as to the touristic practices that gradually
merge the consumption of products (shopping) with culture (events) and places (Urry
1995, 148–51). In fact, Feldmann emphasizes that it is difficult for sponsors to attract
clients to Austria’s Voralberg region without offering a special event (1992, 88n5):
In an age of telecommunications and over-crowded schedules . . . contacts are more
difficult to achieve. There must be an occasion, an opportunity must be found. An
evening of opera under the open sky, for example, with a sunset on Lake Constance, a
business discussion in a holiday-like setting . . . Combined with a personal tour of the
lake-side stage, with a look backstage, to be on stage. “By the way, the performance was
made possible through our support.” Your business partner will be amazed, your pres-
tige will grow. (Feldmann 1992, 83)

Regional sponsors, such as the Wine Growers Association of Lower Austria (Winzer-
verband Niederösterreich) utilize the site to emphasize their “rootedness” in the re-
 Sponsoring Events 143

gion and to promote regional identity as product identity. Toward this end, the grow-
ers developed a special festival wine, including opera motifs on the labels, to be sold
during the festival season (Feldmann 1992, 88n6). The cultural production, the re-
gion, and its products are linked symbolically and physically to the festival through
their visual and material consumption by the participants.
In this manner, both the Bregenz Festival and the regional sponsors are promoting
regional business development through culture. The “environment” of the Bregenz
Festival, as a second-order sign, also relates to the notion of a “friendly or hostile busi-
ness environment.” Communicating the image of an environment friendly to em-
ployees, clients, and customers both at events and in promotional materials referring
to event sponsorship has become a part of corporate cultural politics. Culture be-
comes a vehicle for regional economic development and promotion (Kultur als
Standortfaktor). As Urry observes, tourism is predicated not only upon visual con-
sumption but also on the physical consumption of places (1995, 192), for example,
through increased development of roads, hotels, shopping and restaurant complexes,
or sports facilities. This is certainly the case in Austria, which relies heavily on the pro-
motion and consumption of its own spaces as touristic commodities.
Moreover, festivals in Bregenz, Schleswig-Holstein, or Bayreuth become a stage for
political representation in the sense that they function as validation for the govern-
ment’s economic development projects. Politicians use their appearances at high-
profile events to show their support (real or ostensible) for culture and, more impor-
tantly, as a stage for their own promotion, resulting from the attendant media
coverage.15 In this respect, the staging of events plays an integral role in “promotional
politics” (Wernick 1991, 124–51). The political and economic interests of corporate
cultural politics and state cultural politics converge. The cultural production itself re-
cedes strategically (through the instrumentalization of its communicative value) into a
subordinate position. In the case of the Wine Growers Association, regional identity,
product identity, political identity, and economic identity are fused within the site of
the cultural event. The festival event becomes a symbolic stage for the marriage of re-
gional economics and politics at the altar of high culture.
The emphasis on “visualization” techniques utilized at Bregenz indicate a shift
from aural to visual modes of reception within event and media culture. With regard
to rock music, Lawrence Grossberg writes, “The visual (whether MTV, or youth films
or even network television, which has, for the first time since the early 1960s, success-
fully constructed a youth audience) is increasingly displacing sound as the locus of
generational identification, differentiation, investment and occasionally even authen-
ticity” (1994, 54). In his review of the thirty-six-meter wall designed for Fidelio at
Bregenz, Klaus Umbach remarks that
not even Pink Floyds “Wall” was constructed and equipped as bombastically as this
icon of the 1950s. . . . From the back, this monster looks like a launch runway from
“Star Wars.” . . . From the front . . . it is a smooth, black facade, behind which the horror
144 Sponsoring Events

[of the piece] resides, with a lot of hidden high tech. When . . . the orchestra . . . intro-
duces the most famous choir of prisoners in opera . . . then the shutters on . . . seven
tracks within the Bregenz wall ascend to the sky; 45 small, chalk-white, spotlighted cells
open up and out of 45 mens’ throats resounds Beethoven’s alluring call: “O welche
Lust!” (1995, 158)

Elaborate technical productions have become an essential component of event cul-

ture, particularly rock tours, for example, the Rolling Stones Voodoo Lounge Tour
stage with its monumental viper. Following prior performances in London, Tokyo,
Sydney, and Madrid, American Express sponsored what it called “the most beautiful
and spectacular Carmen that there ever was” in Dortmund with José Carreras and
Julia Migenes on a revolving stage surrounded by “hundreds of singers and dancers,
horses and bull fighters.”16 Special effects were a standard part of the production
repertoire of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals of the 1980s and 1990s (e.g.,
Phantom of the Opera, Cats, Starlight Express, Sunset Boulevard ).
Events as diverse as Bregenz’s Fidelio, Rolling Stones tours, or Webber’s musicals
share similar production strategies, regardless of differences in content and audience.
Such strategies not only reflect the dissemination of a visual aesthetics of effects—e.g.,
of lighting, computer animation, physical size, scale, movement, collision, or destruc-
tion—that have been defined largely through the globalization of electronic media,
but they also underscore the proliferation of a standardized administration and pro-
motion of event culture on a global scale. Just as traveling museum exhibitions facili-
tate cultural globalization, event culture is also produced and packaged for global mar-
kets and staged locally. Corporations employ similar promotional strategies (e.g., VIP
receptions, collateral events, tourist packages, image advertising) whether they are
sponsoring Carreras in Carmen (American Express) or the Rolling Stones (Volkswagen).

Open-Air, Rock, and Youth Culture

Mass media dissemination and local reproduction are integrated in order to maximize
the economic and promotional potential of cultural production. Concerts on tele-
vision heighten the audience’s demand to experience artists live and in person. Alterna-
tively, live concerts reinforce the demand for concert videos and recordings. Although
spectators attend an event to experience a particular artist, group, or repertoire, these
expectations have already been mediated and conditioned by recordings, prior con-
certs, and media promotion (Wernick 1991, 114–15). Despite their distinct contexts of
reception, the interaction of live events and their reproduction or dissemination in
media defines individual and collective expectations and constructs the cognitive and
physical process of experiencing.
Audiences want to realize their expectations and to be surprised by the unexpected
(Rau 1994, 251). This sensory stimulation could range from a sunset during an aria be-
hind the opera amphitheater in Verona to body surfing in the “mosh pit” at a rock
concert. Although the object of the event itself (the performance of the cultural prod-
 Sponsoring Events 145

uct) provides a pretext or occasion for attending, for audiences the event is constitut-
ed through the process of interaction and mediation between the performance itself
and the context of the performance. The spectator can listen to the song at home on a
CD or watch a video; however, it is the psychophysical engagement of the individual
within a specific site that offers the experience of a broader range of stimuli (intellec-
tual, emotional, sensory) than the familiar contexts of home, work, or commuting
(Schulze 1992, 135).
Christof Graf traces the power of open-air events to their roots in outdoor rock
concerts of the 1960s and to their function as a platform for mediating ideologies
(1996, 47–48). Although sponsors and event producers attempt to organize and struc-
ture the contexts of events through production technologies and promotional images,
it is during the process of reconstructing the experience of the event that audiences
can potentially construct their own spaces and definitions of events. The following ex-
amination of the intersection of event culture and youth subcultures will explore the
extent to which events offer such spaces, not only for corporate cultural programming
but also for the construction of social identity and community.

Open-Air Movies: The Drive-In Revisited?

Open-air movies, which have become popular among young, urban audiences in
Europe, illustrate increasingly complex relationships among production, perfor-
mance, and reception. Open-air films are frequently projected on an inadequate
screen with comparable sound quality, and viewing one as a “live” performance is less
important to the audience than spending a summer evening under the stars. In this
respect, the popularity of the open-air movies may share some of the features of the
old drive-in theaters in the United States or the Auto-Kino in Germany, which are
rapidly disappearing. (Open-air movies have also enjoyed sporadic popularity on col-
lege campuses in the United States.) Open-air movies in Europe distinguish them-
selves from traditional movie going through both their interactive and their performa-
tive qualities.17 Audiences at open-air events arrive up to two hours ahead of time to
socialize, eat, and drink. Many open-air movies are well-known classics or cult films
(e.g., The Rocky Horror Picture Show) rather than first-run features. The audience
knows the plot and may only watch the film intermittently while conversing and cir-
culating, much in the way they view video clips on MTV. One of Germany’s leading
movie critics, Peter Buchka, concluded that “one does not simply go to a perfor-
mance; rather, one uses it for one’s own performance. To a great degree it is a matter of
the mixture of various experiences [Erlebnis-Mix], which such a special event promises,
that is important.”18 In the case of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, specific scenes and
dialogue have become part of the cult repertoire, functioning as cues for audience
performance.
On the one hand, the popularity of open-air movies may mean that youth audi-
ences are redefining the function of events in their own way for various types of inter-
action that privilege the audience over the cultural production or performance, or
146 Sponsoring Events

that they are structuring their own interpretations as a basis for performance (in the
case of Rocky Horror). Although the significance of the film does not dissolve, the film
does become relativized as only one part of the experience rather than the experience.
On the other hand, does this process imply a devaluation of the film medium as a cul-
tural production, if it is reduced to a subordinate or superficial role of background, as
if it were mere Muzak? Unlike the ritual reenactment of The Rocky Horror Picture
Show, which engages the audience in a performative mode (i.e., interacting with the
content of the film), open-air movies seem to relegate film to atmosphere. Thus, they
may serve similar functions as the drive-in movies, albeit in different historical and so-
cial contexts.

Youth Scenes
The shift to audience performance can also be seen in the popularity of rave and tech-
no, as well as subsequent Love Parade and Mayday Party (rave) events in major urban
areas during the 1990s (including Berlin, Zurich, Cologne, Munich, and Vienna)
(Henkel and Wolff 1996, 106). The first Love Parade in Germany began in 1989 in
Berlin with approximately 150 people following a VW van under the banner “Peace,
Happiness, and Pancakes.” By the late 1990s, the Berlin Love Parade was an event (es-
timated at more than 500,000 participants) promoted by the international media as a
“World Party”; promotions included pictures of the Brandenburg Gate in the back-
ground, symbolizing postunification, global culture.19 The parades combine outdoor
processions through cities with alternative styles of dress, performance, and music in a
carnival atmosphere. However, the participants attempt to resist the commercializa-
tion of a “carnival tradition” (like that of, e.g., Mardi Gras in New Orleans; Carnival
in Rio de Janeiro, or Fasching or Karneval in Germany) by creating their own fashion
or design styles.20 Although the music and the site are components of the events, they
do not constitute them. The meaning of the event is constructed through the partici-
pants’ own utilization and modification of dress, body decorating, dance, music, and
interaction.21 Techno fans are frequently more interested in producing their own per-
formances and utilizing music they can dance to than in listening to a group on
stage.22 With regard to the role of rave culture in constructing identity for younger
women in Britain, Angela McRobbie concludes,
This interplay of dance, music and image produces a powerful popular aesthetic.
Immersion in rave also influences patterns of love and friendship. Despite being osten-
sibly open to all, the codes of “rave authenticity” which include “white label” tracks,
fanzines, flyers as collectors’ items, well-known DJs, famous clubs, legendary raves,
double meanings in music lyrics, argot, ritual and special items of clothes, are continu-
ously drawn upon as resources for constructing who the raver is. (1995, 173–74)

Events are both linked to and an expression of a subculture’s ongoing process of self-
definition. For McRobbie, the attraction of subcultures within youth culture is found,
in part, within “the modes of empowerment they offer” (174). By shifting the focus
 Sponsoring Events 147

from the artists’ (re)production and performance to audience performance and con-
struction of events, the institutional and promotional systems of event development
and marketing are at least temporarily destabilized. The “subversive” element of sub-
culture events resides both in their potential to challenge the commercial rationality
of a structured marketplace of producers who control financing and distribution and
in their potential to reconfigure cultural representation and meaning. Sarah Thorn-
ton’s research on British rave culture and the media illustrates how youth subcultures
also utilize media in the construction of their own subculture:
Youth subcultures are not organic, unmediated social formations, nor autonomous,
grass-roots cultures which only meet the media upon “selling out” or at moments of
“moral panic.” Micro-, niche and mass media are crucial to the assembly, demarcation
and development of subcultures. They do not just represent but actively participate in
the processes of music culture. (1997, 188)

Information on the rave and techno scenes (McRobbie 1995) indicates that a signifi-
cant portion of participants both come from middle-class backgrounds and tend to be
employed in middle-class positions (e.g., as a bank teller).23 Events such as the Love
Parade offer the opportunity to escape the conformity of these structured workplaces.
They are attractive, at least in part, as a subversion of the middle-class stereotype and
of media attempts to label and organize their status (e.g., as members of Generation X
or Generation Y).24 For sponsors, it is precisely this tension between resistance or es-
cape on the one hand and accommodation on the other that makes such events useful
as sites of intense audience participation. Thornton points out that “moral denuncia-
tions” of youth culture in the media are often part of publicity campaigns designed to
“render a subculture attractively subversive as no other promotional ploy can” (1997,
184).25 The higher the level of attraction (or the tension that leads to that attraction)
associated with an event, the greater potential the sponsors see for engaging an audi-
ence. Within the youth subculture of techno parades, the event represents precisely
that domain in which nonconformity (versus the structured rationality of everyday
life) is expressed. In this respect, the struggle over the representation of the event with-
in the subculture is truly contested.
The shifting contours of youth subcultures present a challenge for corporations
and their sponsorship programs that attempt to assess and organize cultural produc-
tion. Nonetheless, corporations have become adept at exploring, delineating, and ap-
propriating new cultural territory. One way in which this occurs is, as Grossberg ob-
serves, the “attempt to organize taste via the marketing of scenes.”26 Subculture scenes
are of special interest to producers of consumer products if they can be defined by “a
particular logic which may, in a sense, transcend any particular musical content, thus
allowing the scene to continue over time, even as the music changes” (Grossberg 1994,
46). Scenes are characterized by the intersection of cultural practices (fashion, music,
language) and sites where they are articulated or acted out.
For Schulze, the desire for collective forms of orientation defines almost all scenes
148 Sponsoring Events

and involves a notion of community or collective, even if it is not explicitly expressed

by its participants (1992, 463–64). In his study of subculture scenes in Germany, he
identifies youth scenes as constituting the largest proportion of all types of scenes and,
more significantly, exerting the greatest influence on other scenes (e.g., those charac-
terized by high culture, new culture, pub culture, or community-center culture) (470,
494). By observing and attempting to participate in youth scenes, corporate sponsors
want not only to gain access to markets but also to enter communication networks
within youth scenes that provide “input” for other scenes (Schulze 1992, 494). The
commodification of scenes through their representation in promotional culture (e.g.,
advertising) further reinforces the status of youth culture within media culture at
large. A large portion of event culture is composed of events oriented toward youth
markets, despite the fact that many events (musicals, festivals, operas, symphonies, or
exhibitions) are associated with middle-aged fans or audiences. Many events outside
of youth culture reconfigure and appropriate media images from youth scenes, linking
them to associations of “youthfulness” or “dynamism,” which are especially appealing
to middle-aged and older audiences.27
The marketing and commodification of the techno scene in Germany resulted in a
national or European “Techno Tourism,” but it also led to a return to local clubs as
the raves or larger events lost their attraction (Henkel and Wolff 1996, 109, 154).
Rather than attempting to decipher the “codes” of youth subculture, sponsors chose
to develop programs that would allow their market and trend researchers to become
part of the scene (Henkel and Wolff 1996, 150) and in some cases to organize it. In
fact, sponsors were involved in promoting the Love Parade from the very beginning,
starting with a modest contribution of DM 700 and progressing to contributions of
more than six figures by the mid-1990s. More importantly, sponsors utilized the event
as a stage for product promotion and merchandising (Henkel and Wolff 1996, 150). In
addition to achieving image transfer, market research on subculture scenes may be a
major objective of sponsorships. The data gathered from sponsorships, which provide
access to subculture scenes, are then translated into new products and services.
One example of corporate exploration into youth scenes was a promotional cam-
paign linking various youth scenes with events sponsored by Philip Morris and inte-
grating them into an advertising campaign for “Light American” cigarettes in Ger-
many. Each market, which by no means constituted a scene in the sociological sense,
was assigned a “minister,” who appeared regularly in advertisements and was in charge
of coordinating events related to a particular “scene.” The “minister for design and
fashion” (Isabelle von Waldburg) sponsored competitions for young designers, schol-
arships at Hamburg’s Design Academy, or moderated discussions on fashion trends
on television. The “minister for music and nightlife” (Michael Reinboth) sponsored a
German tour by French hip-hopper MC Solaar and a competition for best new
bands, and he directed the first “DJ Orchestra” at one of Munich’s “in” clubs (the
Parkcafe). The “minister for love” (Chris Blue) supported an AIDS benefit, sponsored
the Museum of Erotic Art in Hamburg, and appeared with the band Love-Modul on
Figure 5.1. Corporate ministers of culture: defining youth subcultures. Text at top reads, “The ministers have arrived. ‘We
work so that you can have your fun.’”
150 Sponsoring Events

tour. The “minister for tomorrow” (Ossi Urchs) sponsored the Hamburg Media
Festival (Hamburger Mediale), discussions on virtual reality, and cyberspace exhibi-
tions.28 German cigarette manufacturer Reemtsma pursued a similar strategy to ex-
pand its presence within the contemporary art scene by sponsoring the international
art exhibition documenta ix to promote “West” cigarettes through special limited-
edition packages and posters designed by Russian artist Konstantin Zvesdochotov. In
return, Reemtsma sponsored an exhibition of Zvesdochotov’s work in Moscow (Wolf
1993, 365–73).
Various youth scenes are traversed and interconnected for the audience through
the organization and marketing of lifestyle events by the “ministers.” Identities, cross-
ing youth scenes, are mediated by fashion, dress, design; music, nightlife, and enter-
tainment; love and sexuality; media and computer technology.29 Eric Hopf directs
Hop Hopf Schmitz und Schmitz in Berlin, an agency that specializes in scouting
scene trends (e.g., which brands of beer are in or out). However, Hopf concludes that
subculture trends change too rapidly to be directly employed for corporate communi-
cation. Therefore, his firm attempts to decipher the underlying attitudes of various
youth scenes and decode them for corporate managers, who then address scenes using
the appropriate language and message. Rather than relying on traditional forms of
promotion such as posters and advertisements, agencies organize parties and print
their own T-shirts and caps for the event. Like other areas of cultural programming,
sponsors increasingly design, initiate, and produce culture rather than simply financ-
ing events. Philip-Morris’s competitor, R. J. R. Reynolds Tobacco, has also attempted
to link their product (Camel cigarettes) with the techno scene by sponsoring large
raves and DJ competitions and by producing recordings. However, such promotions
do not go unnoticed by the audience they address, and they frequently backfire if they
are not carefully designed and implemented. Such was the case when one sponsor
produced a special unisex perfume, Eau Techno, which became the object of consid-
erable derision.30
As Thornton points out, “Youth culture’s hierarchies operate in symbiotic relation
to a diversity of media. Media not only act as symbolic goods or marks of distinction,
but as institutions. They are crucial to the creation, classification and distribution of
cultural knowledge” (Thornton 1997, 188–89; see also Gottdiener 1995, 185). Youth
culture draws on the media to reformulate subculture identities, in terms of both re-
sistance and accommodation, while the media respond to new formations within sub-
cultures with their own strategies of resignification and distribution.31 Although
Schulze’s analysis implicitly confirms this symbiotic relationship between subcultures
and the media, in the sense that they “learn” from each other, he also argues that the
institutions of cultural production are primarily reflexive; that is, they orient their ac-
tivities toward having an effect on their audiences (1992, 425). Subcultures are inter-
ested less in their impact on media culture at large than in their impact on their own
articulation and formation of identity and in their interaction with other participants
within a scene or subculture, although they are not completely indifferent to their ef-
 Sponsoring Events 151

fect on the media. Their primary orientation is to the media culture within the sub-
culture and its uses in constructing and communicating identity, such as fashion,
posters, T-shirts, flyers.32 In any case, the relationship between youth subculture and
media may be characterized as functionally symbiotic but asymmetrical in terms of
institutional production of social and economic relations. Moreover, the representa-
tion of the youth scene is a contested space within which the participants (individuals,
subcultures, artists, media, nonprofit groups, and corporations) can redefine expecta-
tions and meanings within specific contexts of events.
Although techno parades and other events of youth subcultures (or scenes that cut
across subcultures) should be considered not as organized social resistance but, rather,
as ways that youth subcultures define themselves as what they are not (McRobbie
1995, 173–74), they do indicate a tentative rejection of institutionalized event culture.
However, Schulze argues that “our habituation to the institutionalized production of
culture has gone so far that we can hardly imagine our own production of culture as a
common practice within the realm of everyday aesthetics” (1992, 519). The notion of
an unstructured, spontaneous event, or an event not based on the market rationales of
“success,” seems to be an anomaly within event and media culture, which attempts to
appropriate the “spontaneity” of the “happening” and serialize it by buying into suc-
cessful events (e.g., concert series or tours) or by creating new events (e.g., techno par-
ties and festivals). Indeed, the administrative and organizing logics of institutionalized
cultural production (music festivals, theaters, museums, symphonies) are, as Schulze
points out, a function of their desired effect on the public (recognition, validation,
audience approval) (425). This manufactured spontaneity characterizes the parameters
within which many sponsored events occur, such as the revivals of Woodstock in 1994
and 1999.

Woodstock Revisited: Back to the Future?

Events such as Woodstock ’94 and Woodstock ’99 remind us that although audiences
may play an increasingly important role in participation and performance within
event culture, the institutionalized production and signification of the event by the
media and sponsors assumes a pivotal position in organizing and structuring events.
The manner in which this structuring occurs relates to image as well as consumption.
In this regard, I will focus primarily on Woodstock ’94 in order to illustrate how the
original event was recycled and reconfigured, before making some brief comments on
Woodstock ’99.
Marketing the image of Woodstock ’94 involved the simultaneous deconstruction
of the original Woodstock (now framed as a passé and somewhat naive event linked to
the sociopolitical aspirations and culture of 1960s youth) and the construction of
a modified image that, ironically, utilized Woodstock as a cultural signifier of noncon-
formity, social harmony, and noncommercialism. This reconfiguration of Woodstock
was based on an apolitical, environmentally friendly, and technologically conscious
consumerism.
152 Sponsoring Events

The promoters (PolyGram Diversified Ventures) employed the residual positive

images of the original Woodstock while satirizing its anticonsumerist worldview as
obsolete. The positive image dimensions included notions of love and sexuality (one
promotional item was an official Woodstock ’94 condom wrapped in psychedelic
foil labeled “i come in peace”); music as an expression of youth culture, global
peace, and the environment. Liquor and cigarette advertisers were rejected because
PolyGram believed they would “tarnish” the Woodstock trademark (Milward 1994,
36).33 The “fabled dove and guitar logo” that subsequently became a promotional
signifier for the 1969 Woodstock Festival was modified to two peace doves sitting on
the neck of a guitar (Milward 1994, 36). Peace, music, and a sense of community,
symbolized by the two doves, linked images of the original Woodstock with the new
Woodstock ’94 and the later Woodstock ’99. Pepsi paid two million dollars for the
rights to use the dove and guitar logo in conjunction with its corporate logo, thus
facilitating the subsequent image transfer from Woodstock ’94 to the Pepsi image
and product. Woodstock ’94 as a unique event (an Erlebnis) epitomizing the experi-
ence of “living life” and uniting a “new generation” through its own event was ex-
pressed in the slogan “Live it. Love, Pepsi.” Meanwhile, the distinct social and po-
litical contexts of the two events were essentially depoliticized as part of Pepsi’s
promotion, as reflected in the financial media’s commentary: “In fact, Pepsi may be
a perfect sponsor. Earlier this year, it cleverly spoofed Woodstock in a commercial
showing yuppies with BMWs and cellular telephones converging on a Woodstock
reunion.”34
Unlike the promotion of the the original event, the promotion of Woodstock ’94
left nothing to chance. The primary source of revenue for the sponsors (Pepsi and
Häagen-Dazs) was not the event itself but, rather, the income derived from promo-
tion and advertising prior to the event. Pepsi published 10 million copies of a guide to
Woodstock ’94, available in convenience stores, supermarkets, and movie chains.
Woodstock ’94: The Guide included information on the performers as well as “whimsi-
cal” statistics, such as the fact that Pepsi expected the participants to consume 76.2
million fluid ounces of Pepsi and 12 million fluid ounces of Lipton Brisk Iced Tea
(also a Pepsi product) (Milward 1994, 36). The promoters, PolyGram, only projected
breaking even on the event itself ($30 million in costs versus $33.75 million revenue
from tickets), so most of the pre- and postpromotion was targeted toward potential
revenues from pay-per-view, soundtrack, movies, home video, and merchandising.
PolyGram president John Scher conducted market studies in order to assess which
artists and bands would appeal to the sixteen- to twenty-five-year-old target audience
for Woodstock ’94 and was surprised to learn that older groups, such as Crosby, Stills,
and Nash, tested positively (Milward 1994, 36). This is, however, not surprising given
the ongoing reception of musical styles and artists associated with 1960s rock and roll
and their subsequent promotion as rock classics (e.g., Jimi Hendrix, the Grateful
Dead, or Led Zeppelin) (Ross and Rose 1994, 8–9).35
Figure 5.2. Consuming Woodstock.
154 Sponsoring Events

Woodstock ’94: Theme Park for “The Woodstock Nation”

“Festivals within the festival,” such as Ravestock at Woodstock, situated Woodstock ’94
within the party culture of rave and resignified the original Woodstock:
Woodstock 69 was one of the biggest parties ever—so big its repercussions are still
being felt. We are providing no less an opportunity for Woodstock 94 to become re-
nowned as another historic party with the addition of Ravestock at Woodstock.36

The Ravestock promotion erases the sociopolitical associations of the original

Woodstock and reconfigures it simply as “one of the biggest parties ever.” For the pro-
moters, Woodstock was only useful as a vehicle for publicizing raves as new event
products in the United States:
Our goal has been to awaken America to the electronic dance revolution by incorporat-
ing raves into the festival movement in this country. The Woodstock festival has served
to define an entire generation. Woodstock 94 will define our generation and is the ideal
vehicle to introduce electronic dance to the masses.37

Another festival within the festival, the Mind Expansion Village, employed images
of the psychedelic counterculture of the 1960s but resignified them as technological
(i.e., occurring in cyberspace) rather than psychological or physiological exploration.
The “village” (playing on associations of the “global village”) included the Surreal
Field and the Communications Village. Both events addressed youth culture through
computers and electronic technologies, but they did so primarily in depoliticized,
promotional, and product-related terms.38 MEGA Interactive Festivals, Ltd., de-
scribed the Surreal Field as a six-acre “interactive village” designed to “provide a futur-
istic experience for the Woodstock nation.” The political content of Abbie
Hoffmann’s “Woodstock nation” was thus transformed into a catchall designation for
anyone in the younger generation. The Surreal Field was a promotional festival for
technology producers to showcase their products. A compact-disc interactive (CD-I)
exhibit “demonstrating music, film and game software titles for this revolutionary
home entertainment system in a 200,000 square foot theatrical arena” included
a sculpture, a multimedia theater, and an interactive live performance by Todd
Rundgren, all sponsored or “showcased” by Philips Media. Apple Computers pro-
duced the daily “Woodstock ’94 Nation News,” which was projected onto image-
magnification screens on the main stage and presented game, music, and sports CD-
ROMs in the Apple tent. General Cinema Corporation sponsored Peter Gabriel’s
MINDBENDER, “a ten-passenger capsule style motion simulator” that was billed as
“the first music video you can ride.”
Danny Scolof, president of MEGA, characterized the fusion of event, entertain-
ment, and electronics within “game culture” as “a confirmation of the interactive gen-
eration. We are witnessing the cultural impact of the first post-graduates of ‘Nintendo
University’. These forward-thinking individuals are not content to sit and observe—
they participate!”39 The Surreal Field underscores the function of “interactivity” in
 Sponsoring Events 155

sponsored culture: to engage audiences at specific sites and contexts, not only with
other participants but also with the sponsors and their products. “Interactivity,” the
buzzword among event sponsors in the 1990s, referred to technological modes of ex-
pression and mediation (interactive performances) as well as to the use of technology
to structure that interaction, for example, in simulated rides, interactive compact
discs, and multimedia theaters (such as IMAX) (Schreiber 1994, 241–43). In this re-
gard, game culture is an increasingly important component of youth culture (Gross-
berg 1994, 54; see also 58n15), since it is an important dimension of how youth use
technology to construct culture and identity (Thornton 1997).
The Communications Center Project within the Mind Expansion Village provid-
ed interactive links among festival participants and to the “outside world” through a
variety of communications technologies: radio network, computer network (e.g., on-
line conferences, video-art, festival news), video art show, and documentaries. These
conversations on the Internet were projected onto a 250-foot-wide video screen. With
respect to these and other “events at the event” (such as the Eco-Village), Woodstock
’94 mirrored similar developments in contemporary environments for consumption,
for example, events at malls, at theme parks, or at “hyperstores” (i.e., stores within a
store).
Indeed, the future of many festivals may be related conceptually to theme parks
or malls,40 which provide a variety of interactive experiences within the context of
larger events. Disney World and other theme parks offer such interactive events on a
daily basis, combined with opportunities for product promotion and consumption.
The hybridization of themed and event environments is also reflected in urban archi-
tecture, such as in the work of David Rockwell, who designs “multisensory” environ-
ments, or “Imax-itecture.” The New York Times commented that “Mr. Rockwell’s
work embodies the current convergence of technology, entertainment and design”
and is indicative of “a citizenry hungry for rapid-fire visual and spatial imagery. . . .
It’s a type of design that could only exist now.”41 With respect to a cultural politics
of space, such strategies facilitate the insertion of corporate interests within the sites
of events. They organize, structure, and mediate the aesthetic processes of experienc-
ing events through product images, technologies, and consumption. In this sense,
the consumption of the event, as a function of lifestyle, facilitates the integration
of the event into patterns of everyday life (and lifestyles) that reinforce patterns of
consumption.
Ultimately, the promoters and sponsors of Woodstock ’94 were primarily con-
cerned with its commercial potential as a product (with all the related licensing, mer-
chandising, and product revenue) rather than with the event itself. If we consider
“Woodstock” as an ongoing process of promotional resignification rather than as a
distinctive break in that process, then the original Woodstock and its successors per-
form similar functions as promotional signs, despite the fact that audiences would
construct their meanings differently. Woodstock as a cultural commodity that in-
volves an ongoing process of recirculating and reimaging cultural signs (“love,” “global
156 Sponsoring Events

peace,” and “freedom”) within changing historical contexts reveals that the images of
Woodstock in media culture (not the historical events) began to elide.
Apart from Woodstock’s capacity to function as a promotional vehicle for the sig-
nification of consumer products, it marks a cultural territory that is challenged within
and between generations as well as between audiences and sponsors. While the 1969
Woodstock Festival, understood as a paradigm for events that were linked to a philo-
sophical or existential Weltanschauung, is certainly over in the sense that most con-
temporary events can no longer fulfill this function (Schulze 1992), it retains its vitali-
ty as a site for the reinscription, defense, or appropriation of cultural meaning. The
debate over what Woodstock actually meant (or means) was most apparent in numer-
ous articles and editorials prior to Woodstock ’94 and to a certain extent after Wood-
stock ’99. For example, in “The Woodstock Wars,” Hal Espen describes both the
mythologizing and debunking of Woodstock and its function as a symbolic rallying
point for generational and ideological conflict (1994, 70–74).42
In 1999, remnants of the Woodstock image, defined as anticommercialism, were
employed both by the audience and the review media in response to the violence that
erupted at the conclusion of the event, resulting in fires, rioting, and sexual assault.
Rolling Stone attributed the violence (which caused an estimated $600,000 in dam-
age) to the audience’s anger over extraordinarily high prices for tickets, food, and
bottled water and over the “squalid conditions and greedy promoters” (Hendrickson
1999, 35). (Although the producers, John Scher and Michael Lang, suggested that the
succession of three heavy-metal bands may have contributed to the violence, they also
conceded that the sanitary conditions were also a factor.) Matt Hendrickson of Rolling
Stone concluded that, compared with other successful events such as England’s Glaston-
bury Festival, Woodstock ’99 failed because its producers were focused primarily on
profit: “Other producers of large events agree that if the first rule is to make money,
the event is doomed to failure” (Hendrickson 1999, 41). It was indeed ironic that the
notion of Woodstock as an event celebrating nonviolence and anticommercialism had
been transformed into the opposite. What is relevant for the purpose of our discus-
sion is, moreover, the media discourse underscoring the links between corporate greed
and the violent response.43
Whether Woodstock is defended by old hippies of the 1960s, rejected by conserva-
tive yuppies, considered marketing hype by Generation X or Generation Y, or adopted
by segments of youth culture as an expression of love, sexuality, and global peace, audi-
ences can use it to define political, generational, or cultural boundaries. Woodstock be-
came as important for what it was as for what it was not. The intersection of culture
and politics as an integral component of Woodstock ’69’s image had to be neutralized
in order to employ it promotionally in subsequent versions of the event. Nonetheless,
the recycling of the event during the 1990s (much like the introduction of VW’s New
Beetle), evidencing its ability to be multiply used in culture and politics, marks its
longevity as an icon of contemporary youth culture and its latent power of subversion.
 Sponsoring Events 157

It’s All for a Good Cause: Mega-Events

Events perform important functions for individuals, groups, and institutions by orga-
nizing and structuring the representation of community. Contemporary events usual-
ly reference social and political issues covertly rather than overtly. Thus, an opera fes-
tival such as the Bregenz Festival may provide the platform for a presentation by an
Austrian politician while serving as a promotional vehicle for regional identity.
However, any clear relationship between the image of the festival and a sociopolitical
agenda is either highly mediated or only articulated through the administrative struc-
ture of cultural politics. The cultural politics of events are, for the most part, implicit-
ly rather than explicitly represented.44 Nonetheless, there are some cultural events that
are primarily concerned with their own representation of social or political issues.
These events are also illustrative of the way notions of community are constructed
and represented within event culture.
One way in which concerts have been linked to social and political action is
through “mega-events” for charitable causes (e.g., Live Aid, Farm Aid, Amnesty Inter-
national’s Human Rights Now!),45 which also receive support from corporate spon-
sors. Reebee Garofalo characterizes them as “mega” because they expand the involve-
ment of artists, promoters, and audiences beyond the site to include simultaneous
events at other international sites as well as broadcasts linking the sites with mini-
events staged by participants in their own community or for viewing at home (1992,
257). Most mega-events are related to concert tours or have an international compo-
nent, although they may be regionally or nationally based. In Germany, Rock against
Racism (Rock gegen Rassismus) or the Band for Ethiopia addressed local as well as re-
gional or global issues.
Garofalo explores four functions (discussed by Tony Hollingsworth) of mega-
event concerts for charity: fund-raising, consciousness-raising, artist involvement, and
agitation (Garofalo 1992, 257, 269n10). High-profile recording artists facilitate the
international distribution of mega-events (on television, video, CD, the Internet, and
other formats) to mass audiences and become attractive vehicles for sponsors such as
Pepsi (Garofalo 1992, 258, 269n14). Artists and audiences seem to be willing to accept
the commercialization of the events for fund-raising if they believe in the cause, al-
though sponsors frequently identify themselves with mega-events rather superficially
in order to fulfill promotional objectives. Although some rock promoters are reluctant
to accept corporate sponsorship, Garofalo argues that
given the scale of mega-events, however, most would be impossible without some kind
of corporate involvement. Amnesty International’s Human Rights Now tour would
have gone bankrupt had not Reebok bailed them out at the last minute. Further, there
is a more optimistic reading of the situation: that the power of popular music—and, in
particular, the phenomenon of mega-events—has obliged corporations and world lead-
ers to accommodate initiatives that are essentially left wing or progressive. (263)
158 Sponsoring Events

However, Garofalo also concedes that charitable mega-events are frequently open to
appropriation or manipulation. For example, Margaret Thatcher delivered “a pre-
taped message on Britain’s concern for the environment” for an environmental fund-
raiser, Our Common Cause at Lincoln Center. The event included artists, entertainers
(e.g., Herbie Hancock, Sting, Richard Gere), and scientists. It was sponsored by Sony,
Panasonic, and Honda—all of whom prominently displayed their logos in the telecast
(Garofalo 1992, 263). The corporate leaders of Reebok, which spent approximately ten
million dollars to finance Amnesty International’s Human Rights Now! tour to four-
teen countries, seem to have been sympathetic to the cause, although they were wary
of aligning themselves too closely to it (T. Harris 1993, 228; Ayub 1993, 66–69). On
the other hand, some sponsors may be willing to accept a level of calculated risk with
respect to social issues precisely because they offer the potential of high-profile events.
Viewing sponsorship of mega-events strictly as a necessary evil or a means to an
end may underestimate the significance of a network of interdependencies among
product culture, its circulation, and the broader context of cultural production and
the mass media. Most sponsorships are integrated into a comprehensive promotional
program that addresses audiences in diverse media and event formats. The impact of a
promotion is cumulative and aggregate. (Although a single event may have a dramatic
impact on altering audience attitudes, positively or negatively.) Although some audi-
ences may regard corporate involvement in charitable mega-events skeptically, corpo-
rations also understand the limits of the events’ impact on audiences and are pragmat-
ic about any financial returns (T. Harris 1993, 228). There seems to be little evidence
that charitable mega-events per se will, as Garofalo suggests, oblige sponsors to as-
sume more-progressive positions. It is more likely that corporate entities, particularly
multinational corporations with diverse audiences and multiple agendas, will negoti-
ate many sources of influence, be they governmental, market, or internal. Moreover,
corporate policies that appear to be socially progressive in one area (e.g., employee
relations) may be regressive in others (e.g., environment, consumer issues, or health
care). Moreover, their policies within foreign subsidiaries and subcontractors may lead
to further contradictions and conflicts with the articulated policy of the corporate
headquarters. Mega-events may contribute to a shift in sponsors’ attitudes and social
policies when sponsors recognize that consumers articulate a sustained, critical aware-
ness of the links between corporate politics and products. Because mega-events tell us
little about the relative progressiveness of their corporate sponsors, they are at best
a weak indicator of corporate responsibility rather than a catalyst for change, as
Garofalo suggests.
With respect to the audiences at mega-events, Garofalo sees their potential in
terms of activating, organizing, and mobilizing support for existing organizations that
will “enlist people directly into the ongoing political activity of the organization.” For
example, Amnesty/USA gained 200,000 new volunteers as a result of the Conspiracy
of Hope tour (Garofalo 1992, 248–49, 268; Storey 1996, 111–12). (In Germany, Am-
nesty International rarely works with sponsors; Ayub 1993, 67). Mega-events linked to
 Sponsoring Events 159

high-profile, socially engaged organizations (e.g., Greenpeace, Amnesty International)

may facilitate volunteer recruitment and provide a sense of community or shared pur-
pose for the participants. The communal character of these events is channeled
through the collective experience of mega-events as a central component of subculture
scenes and shared lifestyles (Graf 1996, 97–98). And it is perhaps in this dimension
that some vestiges of a relation between “a philosophy of life” and the event, to which
Schulze refers, may still exist, albeit through much more diffuse forms of expression
and rebellion.
Yet Garofalo concludes that mega-events cannot simply serve as recruitment or
promotional devices for nonprofit causes if their objectives are not translated into po-
litical action at the macro level. Live Aid organizer Bob Geldof believes that audiences
may also become accustomed to the proliferation of “special” mega-events within
event culture:
We’ve used the spurious glamour of pop music to draw attention to a situation, and
we’ve overloaded the thing with symbolism to make it reach people. But people get
bored easily. People may have been profoundly affected by the Live Aid day—some
were shattered by it—but that does not translate into a massive change in conscious-
ness. (Quoted in Garofalo 1992, 268)

Ultimately, Garofalo links the political power of the mega-event to its potential as a
catalyst for change rather than as a source of consciousness, and “for those interested
in lasting structural change, it has to be recognized that they are no substitute for a
political movement” (268–69). Although Garofalo’s use of the term “mega-event” is
linked with progressive issues and organizations, we should also remember that mega-
events could be used for agendas of social conservatism or for those more susceptible
to resignification by the sponsors.
The latter may be the case with respect to broad-based fund-raising events for
food, children, or world peace that consciously avoid ties with liberal political groups
(such as Greenpeace or Amnesty International). For example, a mega-event to combat
hunger in the United States, Hands across America (1986), was created by Coca-Cola
and Citibank in order to capitalize on the success of the international We Are the
World campaign against hunger by projecting the notion that the corporations were
involved in community charitable causes—or what Schreiber calls “the new customer
partnership”—and product promotion (Schreiber 1994, 3–6). The sociocultural poli-
tics of this “partnership” are clearly embedded in the promotional strategy expressed
by Coca-Cola’s head of public affairs:
Hands Across America was right for the time in America, and right for Coca-Cola.
American concern for homelessness and hunger were at an all-time high. We had just
come off the controversial New Coke introduction and Classic Coke reintroduction.
We needed something to re-bond the company with America. It was perfect. (Quoted
in Schreiber 1994, 5)
160 Sponsoring Events

More than 4 million people participated in the event by joining hands on 25 May
1986. The Coca-Cola/Citibank promotion involved public schools (80 percent of
U.S. junior high schools received social studies kits on hunger and homelessness), the
media (satellite broadcasts and extensive coverage in the press as well as a “Coca-Cola
Radio Network” associated with DJ Dick Clark’s United Stations), celebrity volun-
teers, theme parks, baseball parks, and a “Coca-Cola Cord” strung across sparsely
populated areas of the Southwest.
Hands across America illustrates the intersection of social and cultural sponsor-
ships in corporate cultural politics and the way sponsors appropriate events for chari-
table causes and notions of community to create a shared identification with their
products and image. Such events also indicate that corporations are assuming the
functions of creating and producing social programs (previously considered the do-
main of nonprofits and government) and are structuring them as events designed to
augment promotional objectives. Yet the process of cultural programming and corpo-
rate promotion is constantly subject to its own resignification and social legitimiza-
tion. Consumer loyalties to brands, services, or perceived images can disappear over-
night, and profiles of consumers per se become more illusive. The emergence of social
sponsorships as a component of corporate cultural politics is a recognition of the fact
that corporate legitimacy must be continuously validated.
Perhaps the real potential for engaging subculture scenes for social and political
causes is, at least initially, at the microlevel of organization rather than at the top-
down macrolevel of production and promotion associated with media mega-events.
Local initiatives can still address international or global concerns through grassroots
events linked with local interests, despite their limited media exposure. This is illus-
trated through local organizations such as the Munich nonprofits Sarajevo Is Next
(SiN) and Sarajevo Music Forum (SMF). Protestant groups at Munich universities
developed SiN in 1994 as a result of contacts established in Bosnia during relief ef-
forts, leading to active cultural exchanges between Munich and Sarajevo.46 With the
political assistance of the head of Munich’s Social Democratic Party working with of-
ficials in Sarajevo, SiN organized the successful Futura Sarajewo techno festival, which
was attended by 4,000 in Sarajevo in 1998. (Earlier, high-profile groups, such as U2,
had promised to encourage other bands to perform in Sarajevo, but these plans never
materialized.)
At least one objective of the event was to create opportunities for Sarajevo youth to
share cultural experiences that would rebuild a sense of belonging and community. A
parallel techno festival in Munich, Post Futura, provided the participants with infor-
mation on the social context of Sarajevo by showing Adi Sarajlic’s prize-winning docu-
mentary film Streets on Fire (1997) prior to the festival. In addition, leaders of the SiN
and SMF involved Sarajevo students in rebuilding the city’s cultural infrastructure
through plans for a new cultural center, with partial funding provided by the EU and
sponsors. The program also offered internships in cultural management and media in
Munich for interested students.
 Sponsoring Events 161

Although local initiatives like SiN are certainly not immune to the exigencies of
fund-raising and the interests of sponsors, their local emphases and more tightly fo-
cused objectives make them less appealing for the type of national mass promotion and
commercialization of social spaces (e.g., in schools) manifest in Hands across America.
The interaction between Munich and Sarajevo provides a basis for ongoing social
change through local initiatives rather than the ephemeral impact of most mega-
events, which lack sustained community involvement at local levels. Despite their
greater fund-raising potential, extensive media coverage reaching mass audiences, and
cooperation with international aid organizations, most mega-events do not create the
foundation and continuity for institutional involvements and collaborations—among
local political, cultural, and humanitarian organizations—that would simultaneously
activate, unite, and strengthen subculture communities for social causes.

The Wrapped Reichstag

Finally, I would like to examine an event that illustrates a very different function with
respect to community, the public sphere, and cultural politics in Germany during the
1980s and 1990s: Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s Wrapped Reichstag. From the outset, the
concept of wrapping the Reichstag represented a more subversive response—to the site,
to the historical image of the building itself, and to German cultural politics of na-
tional identity—than any other event in recent decades. The project (formally titled
Wrapped Reichstag, Berlin, 1971–95) reproblematized the cultural politics of national
identity and of corporate sponsorship. Manfred Enssle and Bradley Macdonald ob-
serve that the project posed a series of challenges to contemporary paradigms of pub-
lic art and its financing (1997, 1–2, 11).
The first and perhaps most important provocation relates to the site and its signifi-
cation. When Christo and Jeanne-Claude first conceived the project in 1972, the
Reichstag was located in the center of a divided Berlin, next to the Wall, and symbol-
ized the historical experience of a divided nation as well as the East-West conflicts of
the Cold War. In 1986, Christo remarked that “the building is of the greatest impor-
tance with respect to the German nation and European history and it is related quite
dramatically to that which Germany is today.” Christo was more concerned with the
symbolic character of the Reichstag and its environment than with the architectural
features of the structure: “I’m primarily interested in the site. The building in and of
itself is not especially interesting” (quoted in Yanagi 1993, 23, 26). After German unifi-
cation, the symbolic power of the Reichstag site still carried its historical associations;
however, these also assumed a new dimension: the debate on Germany’s new capital
(Bonn versus Berlin).47
The notions that the meaning of art could develop out of its relationship to the
political and social symbolism (embedded in the site of its production and exhibition)
and that this symbolism could be employed as a form of “material” for the creation of
the artwork reinserted the controversial relations between art and politics into the de-
bate over a cultural politics of national identity.48 The temporary character of the
162 Sponsoring Events

wrapping and viewing by the public also stood in contrast to the perceptions of
“permanence” and “continuity” that many associated with the Reichstag. The proj-
ect challenged both the permanence of the work of art and its mode of exhibition
(i.e., enclosing a public building at a public place rather than in a museum), and in
doing so it contested representations of the Reichstag based on a cohesive national
identity. Enssle and Macdonald argue that, through its interrogation and deconstruc-
tion of notions of immortal, auratic art and its provocative resignification of public
space, the Wrapped Reichstag “engender[ed] both a ‘game with time’ and a ‘communi-
ty of dialogue’” that functioned “both as an aesthetic event and as a cultural—indeed
historical and political—intervention” (1997, 1–2).
Both before and after unification, the political and cultural debate over Christo and
Jeanne-Claude’s project reiterated the symbolic importance of the Reichstag and its rep-
resentation with respect to national identity. In the late 1970s, Bundestag president Carl
Carstens (Christian Democratic Union [CDU]) had rejected the project, fearing that
the symbolic integrity of the building could be damaged, while the mayor of Berlin,
Claus Schütz (Social Democratic Party [SPD]), and the head of the Social Democrats,
Willy Brandt, embraced the project.49 Political debates during the 1970s and 1980s cul-
minated in a narrowly approved Bundestag vote (292–223) for the project in February
1994. The Bundestag’s formal approval could not, however, resolve the inherent con-
tradictions of the so-called Bonn Republic’s cultural politics of national identity,
which failed to come to terms with a conflicted past or present (Vergangenheits- oder
Gegenwartsbewältigung), which the Reichstag represented. (Chancellor Helmut Kohl,
for example, had opposed the project.) Wolfgang Schäuble (CDU/Christian Social
Union [CSU]) assumed a paternalistic view of the project’s reception and interpreta-
tion (“So many people would not be able to understand and accept it”), which also be-
came the basis for his political argumentation. Schäuble perceived the Reichstag as a
symbol of German parliamentary democracy and unity. Employing the political vo-
cabulary of unification, Schäuble asserted that the project would polarize rather than
unite the nation.50 Peter Conradi (SPD) and Freimut Duve (SPD) referred to the posi-
tive value of the project as a counterbalance to negative media images of Germany re-
sulting from hate crimes against foreigners during the early 1990s (e.g., in Rostock,
Mölln, Solingen, and Hoyerswerda). Conradi and Duve argued that German self-
confidence in its national identity could not be fragmented by simply wrapping the
Reichstag. Rather than resolving the differences in a cultural politics of national iden-
tity, the debate over the Reichstag project performed an important function by re-
problematizing the relationship among politics, art, and commerce. In this respect, the
political and cultural debates over the Reichstag became a prologue to discussions over
the reformulation of postunification cultural politics in the late 1990s, particularly
with respect to public spaces, representation, monuments, and remembering.51
Christo’s own financing of the 15-million-mark project (through the sale of signed
limited-edition prints, drawings, and models) presented an alternative paradigm to
government or corporate funding of public-art projects.52 The financing was also an
 Sponsoring Events 163

important part of the project’s design. The artists wanted to create an open area sur-
rounding the Reichstag in which public discourses, performances, and forms of social
interactions could occur without the structural or organizational constraints of gov-
ernment intervention or corporate sponsorship (e.g., advertising, VIP tents, public or
private receptions, or sponsored “events at the event”—all of which attempt to organ-
ize and structure audience participation).53 Indeed, Christo and Jeanne-Claude have
consistently rejected public and corporate funding for their projects:
By financing this project myself, I preserve my integrity. On the other hand, sponsors
and public offices do not have the possibility of becoming involved in such a project.
In 1972, when we initiated this project, there were so many people against it, that no
foundation, government agency, or institution would have become involved in some-
thing that was so controversial, contested, and difficult. However, all of this belongs to
the reality of my project. It is the subversive dimension of my work, which normally
stops people from participating in it. (Quoted in Yanagi 1993, 29)

The Reichstag project was not a naive attempt to deny political, commercial, or
media influences or uses; rather, it recognized these frequently contradictory interests
and engaged them as part of the project itself, for example, during the extensive po-
litical debate over the project. In order to realize the project, Christo and Jeanne-
Claude had to become involved as lobbyists for the Wrapped Reichstag, making fifty-
four visits to Germany between 1976 and 1995. The preliminary process of engaging
the public spheres of politics and cultural criticism—through meetings with public
officials, Bundestag presidents, and the media—became an integral part of the work
and preparation for its ultimate realization after unification (Enssle and Macdonald
1997, 5).
Once the Reichstag was wrapped, it was an overwhelming success in the media as
well as with politicians (including Helmut Kohl), who immediately called for the in-
stallation to be extended beyond the 23 July 1995 deadline and suggested that some of
the additional costs for security could be financed through corporate sponsors.
Politicians pointed to the approaching summer vacation season during late July and
August and the importance of making such a “world attraction” available to the pub-
lic.54 The attempt to capitalize on the Wrapped Reichstag project as a logo for the “new
Germany” (which received positive reviews in the international press) and as an eco-
nomic stimulus for the Berlin economy was indicative of the reformulation of foreign
cultural policy based on the “synergy” of “culture, commerce, and the institutions of
foreign policy.”55 Of course, the plan to transform the Wrapped Reichstag into a longer
“attraction” was rejected by Christo and Jeanne-Claude, who resisted its institution-
alization as a fixture of governmental cultural programming.
The success of the Wrapped Reichstag as a political and cultural event was a result of
its intrinsic challenge to contemporary events in terms of their logics of location, or-
ganization, repetition, permanence, technological (especially audiovisual) mediation,
and structured signification. The Wrapped Reichstag was a postmodern project to the
Figure 5.3. Christo and Jeanne-Claude, Wrapped Reichstag, south facade (wrapping in progress). Photograph by Dave
Yust/Colorado State University.
Figure 5.4. Christo and Jeanne-Claude, Wrapped Reichstag and Brandenburger Tor: symbols of the “new Germany”?
Photograph by Dave Yust/Colorado State University.

Figure 5.5. Christo and Jeanne-Claude, Wrapped Reichstag, west facade. Photograph by Dave Yust/Colorado State
University.
 Sponsoring Events 167

extent that it utilized a widely received symbol as a medium to “de-doxify” (Hutcheon

1991, 7) or destabilize institutionalized representations of the symbol (the Reichstag)
itself. This is the subversive character of the project, referred to by Christo, which in-
tersects with a critical “postmodernism of complicity and critique that at once in-
scribes and subverts the conventions and ideologies of the dominant cultural and so-
cial forces” (Hutcheon 1991, 11). Through its visual aesthetics of negative space
(defining the object in terms of the space around it rather than the space it occupies),
the project presented a catalyst for the signification of what the Reichstag was not
rather than investing in a resignification of what it was. The Reichstag’s symbolic
power as a political and historical signifier provided the attraction of the event for the
spectator while the (subversive) deconstruction of the relations that have defined its
representation (e.g., permanence and continuity versus temporality or rupture) be-
came a catalyst for public discourse and interaction. By intentionally problematizing
the representation of the Reichstag, the project facilitated public involvement both
through spectators’ participation in the event at the site and through public discours-
es regarding the representation of the Reichstag/Wrapped Reichstag (as an art form, na-
tional monument, or political institution) that occurred in the media.
Although the response to the Wrapped Reichstag seemed to be largely positive, the
significance of the project cannot be seen solely in terms of its popular success (and
festival atmosphere); rather, its significance must be considered with respect to its po-
tential to engage discourse on culture and politics within a domain temporarily freed
from institutional interests. Enssle and Macdonald consider the project in relation to
Jürgen Habermas’s suggestion (based on Albrecht Wellmer) that aesthetic experience
“permeates . . . our cognitive significations and our normative expectations”:56
To be sure, discernible emancipatory reverberations did not result from the Christos’
ephemeral aesthetic project. For some people . . . the momentary release or epiphany
created by the aesthetic spectacle sufficed; thereafter life went on. In this sense, the ex-
perience, like other “leisure” activities in the capitalist life-world, provided little more
than a needed respite. . . . On the other hand, new games with time and novel commu-
nities of dialogue became possible because the Wrapped Reichstag opened a physical and
mental space of autonomy. In this space, human beings, if only opaquely and briefly,
could choose to practice and imagine—indeed celebrate—transcendent human possi-
bilities. (Enssle and Macdonald 1997, 20–21)

In her discussion of Christo’s El Tejon Pass project (The Umbrellas, Japan-USA,

1984–91), Judith Baca argues that The Umbrellas did not sufficiently engage multiple
perspectives and communities (i.e., Native Americans) in order to integrate art in
public spaces more fully into the everyday life of diverse communities inhabiting
those spaces (1996, 134–35). However, the Wrapped Reichstag seems to more directly
reference the historical and cultural memory and the participation of communities in

Figure 5.6. A Berlin bank promotes its interests in cultural politics through art acquisitions.
168 Sponsoring Events

interrogating the representation of the site. To a much greater degree than other proj-
ects (such as The Umbrellas), the Wrapped Reichstag references the cultural, historical,
and political ideologies inscribed in the Reichstag and the space it occupies within
Germany. By stimulating diverse discourses within the actual urban space of the
Reichstag (e.g., as it references the ideological and physical spaces of a divided
Germany) and the multiple communities who experienced it, Enssle and Macdonald
argue, the project had “initiated a unique politics of everyday life . . . providing the
possibility of contesting the constraints of the organized life-world” (1997, 15). Yet
Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s project stops short of engaging communities collabora-
tively in the production of culture in public spaces in order to foster their own par-
ticipation in the process of representing communal identities and spaces. Such an
approach was used in Baca’s The Great Wall of Los Angeles project (Lacy 1996, 202),
in community-based projects (e.g., Bonnie Sherk and A Living Library) (Lacy 1996,
275–76), or in projects sited within corporate spaces (e.g., Clegg and Guttmann’s Mu-
seum for the Workplace).
Despite these reservations, the Wrapped Reichstag marked a distinct departure from
contemporary event culture, and from many of Christo’s past projects, in its potential
to stimulate public dialogue on German culture, politics, and national identity. The
Wrapped Reichstag utilized attraction as a form of subversion to destabilize the object
of the event itself (the Reichstag). Even the visual attraction of the Wrapped Reichstag
activated the public’s own sense of visualization and fantasy rather than employing
audiovisual effects as a strategy of suggestion.57 In this respect, the Wrapped Reichstag
did not utilize multimedia technology to organize or structure experience; rather, it
shifted the construction of the event experience to the audience, and in doing so it in-
vited spectators to participate in and assume responsibility for redefining the process of
experiencing the Reichstag and the historical, cultural, and political spaces it occupies.
 Part III

Museums, Cyberspace, Audiences

This page intentionally left blank
 6. The Sponsored Museum;
or, The Museum as Sponsor

The museum must redefine the notion of art as property and its valuation in a centralized market-
place of capitalized goods and ideas. The museum must be an open text of possibility, become a
hybrid space and culture engaged in communication and technologies, through projects that
constantly question its ends. In this way the museum can redefine itself for the next millennium
and contribute to the rethinking of art and culture.
—John G. Hanhardt, Acts of Enclosure

Breaking Down the Walls

The museum assumes a central position in the institutional mediation of culture.
Andreas Huyssen has identified it as “a key paradigm of contemporary cultural activi-
ties” (1995, 14). As a result of its privileged status in cultural representation and media-
tion, it has become an attractive venue for sponsorships that reinforce the institutional
convergence of museum, sponsor, and public cultural policy. We have also observed
that the museum provides a staging area for events, for its own public-relations activi-
ties, and for corporate or public interests. Indeed, museum culture and event culture
may be partially merging. Both are characterized by similar orientations to materiality,
immediacy (e.g., “blockbuster” exhibitions), the primacy of visualization (e.g., the
“visual character of tourism,” Urry 1995, 140), and, more recently, interactivity be-
tween audiences, exhibitions, and technologies as dominant modes of communication.
Thus, contemporary analyses of the museum frequently intersect with notions of
event culture. I have suggested that events not only be investigated in terms of prob-
lematizing the assumptions of the event itself (which Tschumi relates to architecture),
but also with respect to their potential to attract or entertain and simultaneously sub-
vert (i.e., challenge the assumptions of the event). Woodstock and the Wrapped
Reichstag provided examples of contemporary events that operated within the modali-
ties of both entertainment and subversion. In his discussion of audience response to
the blockbuster exhibits of the 1980s, Huyssen proposes that audience desire be recog-
nized as an inherent component of contemporary culture and be productively inte-
grated into exhibitions and curatorial practices: “It is not exactly a new idea to suggest

171
172 The Sponsored Museum

that entertainment and spectacle can function in tandem with complex forms of en-
lightenment in aesthetic experience” (1995, 24). John Hanhardt refers to the tension
or dialectic between entertainment and subversion, or between the museum, its exhi-
bition practices, and the audience, when he calls for the museum to initiate “projects
that constantly question its ends” (1995, 47). Huyssen expresses this ongoing redefini-
tion of the museum in terms of fulfilling an anthropological need directed toward the
past and present, envisioning its potential as “a space for creative forgetting”:
Fundamentally dialectical, the museum serves both as burial chamber of the past—
with all that entails in terms of decay, erosion, forgetting—and as site of possible resur-
rections, however mediated and contaminated, in the eyes of the beholder. No matter
how much the museum, consciously or unconsciously, produces and affirms the sym-
bolic order, there is always a surplus of meaning that exceeds set ideological boundaries,
opening spaces for reflection and counter-hegemonic memory. (1995, 15)

Although the following studies of contemporary museums point to a convergence

of interests among museums, corporations, foundations, and governments, the recon-
figuration of the museum’s mission and its curatorial practices also draw our attention
to the dissonances and paradoxes within and outside the museum that create spaces
outside of institutionally defined boundaries for counter-hegemonic culture. Before
turning to a closer examination of the emerging contours of the global museum, I
would like to highlight some of the theoretical perspectives relevant to our investiga-
tion of the relations between museums and corporations.
A significant feature of the museum is its transformation into a multiple-use cul-
tural center that incorporates production and audience interaction. Architect Ian
Ritchie identifies the Centre Pompidou as a paradigm for this new synthesis of muse-
um and cultural center. More specifically, he perceives a change in the interrelation-
ship among three factors: image (the museum’s location and function within urban
space as a privileged site), container (the “internal spatial experience” visitors share
with one another), and contents (the interaction between visitors and the objects of
the museum’s collection):
The traditional notion of the museum is being challenged by contents becoming
events and container becoming catalyst, which, in turn, is leading the contemporary
museum to become the place not of study, but of provocation and debate (e.g., the
Pomidou Centre, Paris; the Ecology Gallery at the Natural History Museum, London).
This can be restated as a decision on the part of museum directors for the museums to
be part of today’s real world and to be an active educational ingredient in our thoughts
about the future. (1994, 12)

In Germany, Christoph Vitali, director of Munich’s Haus der Kunst, has promoted
the museum as a cultural center for younger urban audiences. Evening and weekend
events integrate entertainment with information, discussions, and guided tours of ex-
hibitions. Yet Vitali claims to attract audiences to the exhibitions themselves, rather
 The Sponsored Museum 173

than instrumentalizing them as promotional packaging. He reports that 8,000 guests

at a film and disco “Party in the Museum,” sponsored by Philip Morris, viewed a
Richard Lindner exhibition well into the early morning: “Our hope of introducing
new segments of visitors to art in this manner was fulfilled” (Bosetti 1997, 122). Stu-
dent memberships entitled younger subscribers to special events at the Haus der Kunst
throughout the year, while wealthy patrons participated in Vitali’s personally con-
ducted art tours.
At the same time, he has attempted to increase consciousness of the historical
function of the museum by integrating a permanent exhibition on the Haus der
Kunst under National Socialism into the entry wing. By focusing attention on the
museum’s historical function as an instrument of National Socialist propaganda, he
also directs the public’s attention to its contemporary function: It is not merely an en-
tertainment venue but also a site where both the historical and contemporary rela-
tions between art and politics are crystallized (Vitali 1997, 5). However, it is not clear
whether the permanent exhibition documenting the role of the museum during and
after National Socialism (located in the wings of the foyer) will eventually be over-
looked by most visitors or become an integral component of contemporary exhibition
practices that interrogate the museum’s own interests, both past and present. Thus,
the Haus der Kunst represents the dynamic tension between entertainment and mis-
sions of museum pedagogy. Vitali’s reformulation of the Haus der Kunst marks the re-
definition of the museum with respect to its relations with the public. This is not just
a part of the wider democratization of museums that occurred during the last three
decades of the twentieth century; it is also a distinctive feature of museum marketing
and promotion, which integrates the museum into urban lifestyles and event culture
(Schulze 1992, 422–23).
Another example of this process is provided by Jean-Christophe Ammann, director
of the Frankfurt Museum for Modern Art, who invited Karl Lagerfeld to introduce the
new Chanel fashion collection in the museum. In a scene reminiscent of Andy
Warhol’s happenings, model Claudia Schiffer wore new Chanel fashions while danc-
ing on artist Katharina Fritsch’s installation Tischgesellschaft (Dinner Partners) (Bosetti
1997, 122). In a similar vein, the Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg exhibited sketches by fash-
ion designer Wolfgang Joop and offered visitors free samples of Joop! perfume and cos-
metics. Although both instances indicate the extent to which the museum has become
the site of postmodern performance and event culture, they also reflect a significant
role reversal. Museums now stage and mediate the promotional activities of commer-
cial enterprises (in this instance, Lagerfeld and Joop) while deriving their own promo-
tional value from events in order to increase attendance. Meanwhile, corporations are
increasingly exhibiting and mediating culture (not limited to corporate products)
through their own museums. The blurring of functional boundaries underscores the
extent to which the interests of corporate and nonprofit institutions are converging—a
process that has been facilitated, in part, by the redefinition or erasure of institutional-
ized notions of high, low, and commercial culture which I discussed in chapter 3.
Figure 6.1. The fashionable museum: the Giorgio Armani retrospective at the Guggenheim.
 The Sponsored Museum 175

By joining other cultural centers offering entertainment, information, and educa-

tion (e.g., theme parks, shopping complexes, urban tourist venues, and universities),
museums attempted to reaffirm their social legitimacy and reinforce their fiscal stabili-
ty at a time when budgets for new projects, particularly in postunification Germany,
were becoming increasingly dependent upon private patronage and corporate spon-
sorship. In order to survive within a marketplace that has organized the commodifica-
tion of experiences (Schulze 1992), the museum has assumed some of the functions of
other cultural institutions (education, public outreach, entertainment). Meanwhile,
the museum’s “competitors” (corporations) have appropriated some of the museum’s
own functions, such as representing, exhibiting, and mediating cultural and techno-
logical artifacts in corporate museums (a dimension which I will also investigate later
in this chapter).
As the museum redefines itself and is defined by internal and external forces, the
distinctions between cultural institutions become less clear. By adapting the survival
strategies utilized by other cultural producers, museums have, since the 1970s, been
able to maintain and expand their programs and meet public-policy demands for in-
creased access. However, they have also had to reformulate their own distinctive insti-
tutional image. In any case, the redefinition of public cultural politics in terms of mar-
kets and public-private “partnerships” (discussed in chapters 2 and 3), suggests the
integration of cultural politics into a marketplace for events and experiences. This
process also reflects a convergence of interests between market-oriented cultural pro-
duction (i.e., the entertainment, media, and consumer product sectors) and nonprofit
or public institutions (Schulze 1992, 528–29).
Whereas the government role of cultural politics in the United States has been rele-
gated largely to a marketplace driven by local public support and private sponsor-
ships, in Germany this process of convergence and assimilation is still characterized
by a tension between political and market interests (Schulze 1992, 529). For Gerhard
Schulze, German cultural politics is situated between two poles that characterized in-
stitutional culture prior to unification, that is, within a spectrum between (1) the total
dominance (or politicization) of culture as it existed in the former German Demo-
cratic Republic (GDR) and (2) the liberal market models of apparent nonintervention
as practiced in the United States and the United Kingdom (522). Although Germany
tries to avoid either of these extremes by “attempting a balancing act between neutrali-
ty and politicization” (523), Schulze concludes that it has become difficult to uncouple
the rationality of the general market for experiences and events (Erlebnismarkt) from
cultural politics, particularly as nonprofit institutions compete with commercial enti-
ties for audiences and revenues (528).
Thus, we can observe two separate but related forces operating in the redefinition
of the museum. First, museums gradually incorporate many of the functions of other
cultural centers. Second, they simultaneously distinguish themselves from other com-
peting museums and cultural centers through thematic specialization. Both aspects—
functional de-differentiation and thematic specialization—are indicative of the process
176 The Sponsored Museum

of cultural hybridization. For example, the proliferation of new science and technolo-
gy museums in Europe and North America, as well as the various permutations of
theme parks with their historical or cultural emphases, signify the process of hybridiza-
tion and de-differentiation (Lash 1991, 5, 11–15). The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and
Museum (Cleveland, Ohio) mediates and represents contemporary history from the
1950s to the present by fusing elements of popular culture and music in its exhibitions
and curatorial practices. As a Hall of Fame that regularly inducts new members and a
museum that offers the spectator the narrative of the “legends” of rock-and-roll history
through multimedia and memorabilia, the center combines elements of a museum,
theme park, information center, and festival (e.g., when performances are linked with
downtown events).
In Consuming Places (1995), John Urry traces the relationship between postmodern
tourism and the significance of place. Hybridization reflects the fact that postmodern
tourism is “segmented, flexible and customised” (151). As touristic practices become a
part of everyday life, the museum becomes less a part of “cultural tourism” than an in-
tegral part of lifestyle: “The contemporary subject inevitably engages in what we
might call tourist practices much of the time. In postmodernity many spheres of so-
cial and cultural life are de-differentiated. Tourism is nowhere and yet everywhere”
(150). Museums assume a pivotal position in cultural tourism and regional politics
due to their importance as a signifier of urban marketing or the “packaging of local
identity” (169). The museum as factor for regional marketing (Standortfaktor) is uti-
lized to define both local, national, and European identities. However, Urry also
points to the obvious paradoxes of conflicting interests when regional urban centers
compete for tourist expenditures, a phenomenon that will accelerate with greater mo-
bility between European cities (e.g., the Eurostar from London to Paris offers week-
end shopping packages).
Walter Grasskamp considers the processes of de-differentiation in terms of the
internationalization of museum architecture and museum management. These pro-
cesses have extended to smaller regional museums and have gradually eliminated his-
torical distinctions between museums, based on national or regional identities or dis-
tinctive collection profiles (1992, 90–91). He argues that the internationalization of
museum management and the proliferation of new museums may lead to a legitima-
cy crisis if museums can no longer perform their traditional functions: selection, fil-
tering, and endowing artifacts with privileged status through curatorial and exhi-
bition practices. Grasskamp questions whether demands to expand holdings will
eventually relativize collections as a whole and in doing so undermine the museum’s
status as a cultural arbiter and filter. If selection criteria lose their plausibility, he
argues, a crisis in selection policies (and legitimacy) is sure to follow (1992, 93–94).
While it is precisely this problematization of selection and curatorial practice that
many critics and artists (e.g., Crimp 1993; Hanhardt 1995; Huyssen 1995) welcome
as an opening for the new museum—indeed, a necessary process in redefining the
museum—Grasskamp suggests that the museum’s social function may inevitably
 The Sponsored Museum 177

erode as it is subject to conflicting cultural and political interests: “In any case, the art
museum’s task of distilling the arrogance of the marketplace, the influence of collec-
tors, the unreasonable demands of the bureaucracy, and the entry applications from
the depots into a socially unifying essence is not becoming any easier” (1992, 97).
If the museum can only survive by constantly redefining its own mission, contexts,
and interactions with audiences and markets, can it maintain sociopolitical legitimacy
and compete with other cultural centers when its institutional status is relativized or
indeterminate? This may be one of the many paradoxes of cultural politics, particular-
ly in postunification Germany. Such paradoxes led Schulze to question many of the
assumptions of German cultural politics since the early 1970s. These include the insti-
tutional consensus that (1) the programs of cultural institutions should, ostensibly,
counteract consumerist behaviors, (2) institutional autonomy can or should be main-
tained, (3) cultural programing designed to address the interests of specific social mi-
lieus must simultaneously appeal to wider audiences, and (4) politics should remain
unpolitical. How indeed “should cultural politics accommodate itself with the para-
doxical imperatives which it has established for itself?” (1992, 527). Schulze concludes
that German cultural politics (like cultural politics in the United States) increasingly
resolves these issues by accepting the economic rationale of the cultural marketplace
that renders the distinctions between cultural politics and market superfluous.

The Global Museum: New York—Bilbao—Berlin and Back

New York—Bilbao
Cultural Politics
One response to these conflicts has been for museum administrators to cultivate a
stable, high-profile image for the museum (through name recognition and architecture)
while changing its contents (Ritchie 1994), and reconfiguring the relations of the con-
tents to audiences through events. In this respect, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Mu-
seum in New York, as an entity of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation (SRGF),
has been “cloning” its image through international branch museums, so-called satel-
lites, which then grow their own local hybrids while trading on the cachet of the Gug-
genheim name. The hybrid Guggenheims incorporate a globalization of the museum’s
image and a market for its collections and merchandising while the local satellites bear-
ing the Guggenheim name are, in theory, allowed to develop their own regional identi-
ty. The expansion of the Guggenheim domestically and internationally has included
the restoration of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York; the Guggen-
heim Museum SoHo New York; the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice; the
Guggenheim Museum Bilbao; the Deutsche Guggenheim Berlin; the Venice Guggen-
heim Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art; and the Guggenheim Las Vegas.1
The globalization of the Guggenheim has been largely the work of its director Thomas
Krens, who aggressively pursued new sites and cooperative agreements in New York
and throughout Europe.
178 The Sponsored Museum

The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao (GMB), designed by Frank Gehry, is a key cul-
tural component of a major urban renewal project that positions the museum and its
image in the center of the battle among European cities for cultural tourism (Ritchie
1994, 12). Extensive construction of a rapid-transit system and a recreational and com-
mercial harbor, including waterfront entertainment, a shopping complex, and a con-
cert hall, are designed to provide new infrastructure and attract corporate investment
(Bradley 1997, 50). Here, Paul Goldberger refers to the Basques as “a kind of cross be-
tween canny developers and political rebels” (1997, 49). The GMB is perceived as a
key factor in improving the image of the city and the Basque region, which is largely
associated with issues of Basque separatism (Bradley 1997, 50). The impetus for the
Guggenheim in Bilbao came, however, not from ETA (Euskadi ta Askatasuna/
Freedom to the Basques), as the radical separatist wing is called, but from the conser-
vative forces of the city of Bilbao. Goldberger remarks, “What could be better than to
channel the nationalist impulses into an art museum that would dazzle the world and
blunt the harsh edges of ETA?” (1997, 48). Toward this end, regional and multinational
corporations (including El Banco Bilbao Vizcaya, The Chase Manhattan Bank, and
Ericsson) have provided funding for the project.2
Initially, Krens was looking for a venue to display or rent out 211 minimalist paint-
ings from Count Giuseppe Panza di Biumo’s art collection, which the SRGF had ac-
quired in 1990. When no major museums were willing to rent the collection for
longer than a temporary exhibition, Krens pursued the idea of finding a Guggenheim
“satellite” in Spain (Bradley 1997, 50). Inspired by Frankurt’s success in cultivating
urban culture through high-profile museum projects, Bilbao proposed an extensive
agreement with the SRGF in 1991, an agreement that would position the museum
(and the city) prominently “along the artistic Atlantic axis with Bourdeaux and Great
Britain” (Bradley 1997, 50). The Basque and regional Biscay governments essentially
paid the Guggenheim to conceptualize, design, and oversee the construction of the
museum and to administer it for a twenty-year contractual period (which could be ex-
tended to seventy-five years).
The new museum in Bilbao was a good deal for the Guggenheim. The Basque and
Biscay governments paid for all construction costs ($100 million) and ongoing opera-
tional expenses and also agreed to pay for all administrative and curatorial services
provided by Guggenheim (Museo Guggenheim Bilbao 1997, 2.1–2.2). The Basque gov-
ernment allocated $50 million to acquire a new Spanish and Basque art collection.
However, the best part of the deal (for the SRGF) was a $20-million tax-free “dona-
tion” made to the foundation by the Basque government, which referred to it as a
“rental fee” in exchange for loan privileges (access to six thousand works in the Gug-
genheim collection) and use of the Guggenheim name for merchandising (Bradley
1997, 51). The GMB was granted exclusive rights in Spain to merchandise products re-
lated to the Guggenheim collection as well as the Bilbao museum’s own holdings
(Museo Guggenheim Bilbao 1997, 6.44–6.47). In addition, the Basque and Biscay govern-
ments carried the sole financial liability for the GMB, an agreement almost identical
 The Sponsored Museum 179

to standard franchising contracts (Bradley 1997, 52). Although subsequent negotia-

tions provided the local governments more authority in the operation of the GMB and
a higher degree of exclusivity in marketing the Guggenheim merchandise in Spain and
Europe, critics pointed out that the economic impact on the region and projections for
ongoing administrative and project costs (targeting 45 percent of total operating costs
from the Basque government and roughly 42 percent from corporate sponsors for ex-
hibitions) were unrealistic (Museo Guggenheim Bilbao 1997, 6.2–6.4; Bradley 1997, 52).
In terms of cultural politics, one of the major motivations for the project was the
Basque government’s desire to promote a positive image for the region in order to at-
tract foreign investors and tourists. The GMB was packaged and marketed to wealthy
tourists (and museum patrons) who might travel from Bilbao up the coast to San
Sebastian and the resorts in Biarritz, France. Here, the GMB envisioned that 40 per-
cent of the projected 500,000 museum visitors (after 2000) would be from outside of
Spain, primarily from the United Kingdom, France, and Germany, shifting most of its
media budget (75 percent) from domestic to foreign advertising (Museo Guggenheim
Bilbao 1997, 6.12, 7.25). At least in terms of museum marketing and development, the
critics may have underestimated the success of Frank Gehry’s architecture in attract-
ing mass audiences to the GMB. Indeed, it far exceeded projections during the first
year, with more than 1,300,000 visitors.
Although the GMB seems to have become an economic and promotional coup for
Thomas Krens—one that he would like to emulate in New York City 3—the actual
development of its contents has been a controversial issue from the museum’s incep-
tion. The extent to which the GMB will be able or willing to cultivate exhibitions re-
lated to regional Basque identity was the object of considerable controversy, particu-
larly during the early stages of the project (Bradley 1997, 105–7). Despite the sizable
budget for acquisitions of Basque and modern Spanish art, both the exhibitions and
the purchases for the GMB have been predominantly modern “masterpieces” that
would either draw from or augment the Guggenheim’s own collection. Although
works by some established Basque artists (Eduardo Chillida) and some in the younger
generation (Juan Luis Moraza, Txomin Badiola, and Prudencio Irazazábal) were pur-
chased or commissioned, many of the major acquisitions to the Basque collection
have been works that Krens believes will complement the SRGF’s own collection and
establish Bilbao’s international reputation through “signature works by foremost mas-
ters of modern art” (GMB press release), including Mark Rothko, Clyfford Still, and
Willem de Kooning (Bradley 1997, 105). Krens also focused the collection on major
acquisitions of works by contemporary European and U.S. artists such as Francesco
Clemente, Anselm Kiefer, Jeff Koons, Sigmar Polke, and Richard Serra. In fact, sepa-
rate galleries were designated for Kiefer and Serra. Despite Krens’s goal that the GMB
should “facilitate a north-south cultural exchange by connecting us to Mexico, Cen-
tral and South America,” his exhibition plans for the GMB drew from the standard
repertoire of Guggenheim touring programs (e.g., 20th-Century Art: Masterpieces from
the Guggenheim Collection) rather than emphasizing the Basque and Spanish modern
180 The Sponsored Museum

collections (Bradley 1997, 105). While the seventeen exhibitions planned from 1997 to
2000 included some Basque and Spanish projects, Bradley observes that the three-year
plan left little room for curators to develop a dynamic program, particularly when they
had to “answer to a director as formidable as Krens” (1997, 105).
Clearly, the Basque government is attempting to carefully balance international
and regional images for the GMB. Will the GMB, under the administrative and cura-
torial control of the SRGF, function primarily in terms of warehousing and filling the
gaps in the Guggenheim’s main collection (through acquisitions of contemporary
Basque and Spanish art) while providing the Basque government an international cul-
tural icon (Frank Gehry’s architecture)? Krens has stated that he conceptualizes the
Guggenheim’s various satellites as operating independently but that the collections
form components of “the Guggenheim as an organism” that is “essentially unified
under one curatorial organization” (Bradley 1997, 53). What consequences does this
unified organization have for developing a range of curatorial practices within a di-
verse regional context? Will Basque art be reduced to a trope within the significantly
larger Guggenheim collection? Bradley questions the extent to which regional Basque
art has been given the potential creative space to evolve independently of the
Guggenheim’s own global curatorial and acquisition strategy (1997, 105).
To the extent that Bilbao’s exhibitions are largely a function of the Guggenheim’s
own interests, the new museum may confirm Walter Grasskamp’s thesis that the inter-
nationalization of museum administration may lead to a greater uniformity of exhibi-
tion and acquisition practices. By functioning as a depot—albeit an architecturally
significant one—for the Guggenheim’s rapidly expanding collections and by exporting
its own brand name for museum administration, marketing, and merchandising,
GMB (and other satellite museums) indicates that differences between museums
based on either regional, national, or even arbitrary patterns of development seem to
be dissolving in favor of a more uniform globalization (Grasskamp 1992, 91).
Krens regards the satellites as a necessary and logical consequence of the SRGF’s
growth strategy and its “operation efficiency,” which is required because the founda-
tion receives no government subsidies (Diamonstein 1994, 150). Although he does not
envision satellites as an option for government-subsized museums, he believes that
more-extensive international agreements and cooperation among museums (which
began with the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Tutankhamen exhibition in 1976) have
become an inevitable part of institutional survival (Diamonstein 1994, 152). Obvious-
ly, major museum collections represent a considerable cultural commodity that can be
circulated to expand the image of the museum and to facilitate its own growth. In the
case of the Guggenheim, its limited exhibition space (despite a highly controversial
expansion project in Manhattan) led to domestic and international expansion both in
order to maximize the economic return on its extensive collections and in order to re-
alize the full potential value of the global communication of its image. With regard to
Bilbao, Bradley concludes that “no matter how eloquent Krens waxes about ‘thinking
 The Sponsored Museum 181

globally,’ the potential for mishaps at the GMB due to cultural misunderstandings is
sobering” (1997, 106).
From a different perspective, the GMB may also be a missed opportunity to en-
gage the uniqueness of the Basque context precisely because the Basque collection is
different from the international collections that are circulated through the Guggen-
heim satellites and rented out for touring exhibitions. In terms of fostering interaction
among the local communities, the contents of the museum, and the museum’s envi-
ronment or structure itself, the GMB may represent a potential that can only be acti-
vated to the extent that the SRGF and the Basque government are willing to relin-
quish a degree of their own control. The potential value of Bilbao could emanate from
creating a cultural context that, as Schulze suggests, is not based on its economic ra-
tionality. Partially uncoupling museums (or other public institutions) from cultural
and institutional politics that demand a return on investment may actually increase
their attractiveness to audiences and, paradoxically, let them become economically
viable (1992, 527–28). Of course, difference and resistance can easily be appropriated
by the networks and markets of cultural production, and institutionalized alterity is
difficult to maintain (Schulze 1992, 519). Nonetheless, even modest efforts in this di-
rection may prove to be more successful in actually creating a distinctive profile for
new museums that could ensure their legitimacy as dynamic forums for social inter-
action rather than solely as markets for cultural consumption. Museums, sponsors, and
governments are increasingly undermining their own goals to differentiate themselves
from other cultural centers by allowing administrative objectives (and the convergence
of economic interests through cooperative agreements, partnerships, or satellites) to
direct programing.

Architecture
Even if the global museum’s contents and exhibition practices seem to grow increas-
ingly similar, one of the most potent symbols that nonprofit and corporate institu-
tions utilize to mediate identity and assert their institutional interests is architecture.
The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, has become
a cultural icon and theoretical point of reference for contemporary architects (Haen-
lein 1994, 24–25). In designing the GMB, Frank Gehry and Thomas Krens reasserted
the Guggenheim as a symbol of avant-garde modernity in a massive structure of lime-
stone and polished titanium (twice the size of the Centre Pompidou), which Gehry
compared to a “metallic flower” (Bradley 1997, 55).
However, the development of the project references images of modernity and post-
modernity. Gehry drew his inspiration from the “surprising hardness” of Bilbao’s
industrial seascape and the futuristic images of urbanity in Fritz Lang’s 1926 film
Metropolis. Referring to both of these sources, Bradley remarks,
Indeed, the GMB calls forth both industrial might and an other-worldly newness. Its
largest shapes, reminiscent of power plants and ship hulls and prows, allude to Bilbao’s
182 The Sponsored Museum

industrial and shipbuilding mastery. Its more freely sculpted forms, such as the “me-
tallic flower,” lend the building an ethereal, space-age character. The building’s inter-
galactic aura is enhanced by its silvery surface . . . which glows and shimmers in the
sunlight and is reflected in the river. (1997, 55)

Gehry’s design has been acclaimed by critics for its imaginative incorporation of dis-
tinctively modern styles (e.g., Gehry transforms Frank Lloyd Wright’s central spiral
into a tilting atrium) and postmodern styles, providing functional yet flexible exhibi-
tion spaces with natural lighting. These range from the immense “boat” gallery (450
feet long by 80 feet wide) for works such as Richard Serra’s Snake (1997; 102 by 24 3⁄4
feet) to more intimate and idiosyncratic spaces. For Krens, experiencing the museum’s
structure is a central part of the GMB’s concept:
Another “theme” of mine was to privilege the architectural experience. As a program
requirement, I told Frank and the other GMB candidates [Arata Isozaki, Coop
Himmelblau] that the building had to be one of the great buildings of the world, as
well as one of the great art museums. (Quoted in Bradley 1997, 53)

New York Times architecture critic Herbert Muschamp considers the GMB a defin-
ing moment both in Gehry’s work and in contemporary architecture. It is a life-
transforming experience—a pilgrimage and epiphany—he calls “the miracle in Bil-
bao” (1997, 54). The GMB is a “Lourdes for a crippled [American] culture: This
building’s design and construction have coincided with the waning of a period when
American architecture spectacularly lost its way” (72). Muschamp argues that the
postmodern architecture of the 1980s sacrificed its creativity and “deteriorated into

Figure 6.2. The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao: art, architecture, and cultural politics. Copyright FMGB Guggenheim Bilbao
Museoa, Bilbao, Spain, 1998. Photograph by Erika Barahona Ede. All rights reserved. Partial or total reproduction prohibited.
 The Sponsored Museum 183

a career strategy for reactionaries, opportunists and their deeply uncultivated pro-
moters. . . . Even without the help of the Disney company, architecture plummeted
into the realm of the packaged tour” (72). Muschamp believes that in Bilbao Gehry
has rediscovered an aesthetic freedom and a sense of the creative force of history that
had been lost in postmodern architecture. Goldberger also heralds Gehry’s design as
one of the century’s great architectural achievements:
It does not cower in denial of modernism . . . but, rather, enhances it by joining mod-
ernism’s power to the civilizing forces of urbanism. And it does not reject the glory of
monumental form, which in an age besotted by the notion that real space may some-
day give way to virtual space makes Gehry almost conservative. (1997, 53)

For Muschamp, Bilbao is a distinctively American work, indeed, a product of

American culture. Marilyn Monroe is the metaphorical embodiment of an “American
style of freedom” in Bilbao:
That style is voluptuous, emotional, intuitive and exhibitionist. It is mobile, fluid, ma-
terial, mercurial, fearless, radiant and as fragile as a newborn child. It can’t resist doing a
dance with all the voices that say “No.” It wants to take up a lot of space. And when the
impulse strikes, it likes to let its dress fly up in the air. (1997, 72)

The sensual appeal of Bilbao reminds us of event culture’s attraction and simultaneous
potential for subversion. The metaphorical implications of the GMB as Monroe—
which Muschamp admits is “totally my projection” (although Goldberger also de-
scribes the museum as “voluptuous”) (Goldberger 1997, 49)—may be less important
for Muschamp than its potential to engage spectators in their own free association
(Muschamp 1997, 82).
Thus, Muschamp attempts to establish the Bilbao experience as paradigmatic in
two respects. First, it reflects the potential of museum architecture to engage specta-
tors (individually and collectively) on an emotional level through the chemistry be-
tween its design and the urban site. Second, the museum is a watershed in American
architecture, particularly in its transformation of both modern and postmodern idi-
oms. Muschamp credits Gehry with rescuing and rejuvenating American architecture
from “the painted desert in which . . . [it] has been stranded in recent years” (1997, 82).
Yet it is precisely a “postmodern architecture as style” that Muschamp invokes when
he defines Bilbao as an architectural milestone:
An art form that has long depended upon appeals to external authority—history, sci-
ence, context, tradition, religion, philosophy or style—has at last come to the realiza-
tion that nobody cares about that sort of thing anymore. Architecture has stepped off
her pedestal. She’s waiting for her date outside a bar on a rainy early evening in Bilbao,
Spain. (82)

I would argue that Bilbao cannot ignore its own dependencies and links to mecha-
nisms of power, legitimation, and social representation, both past and present. In
184 The Sponsored Museum

part, these interests (including those of the SRGF and local and regional govern-
ments) are articulated in a politics of space, that is, the physical, social, and symbolic
spaces the GMB occupies.
By privileging the moment of spectator self-reflection (expressed in the language
of religious mysticism and pilgrimage) and the representational function of the GMB
as a signifier of a revitalized American architecture, Muschamp overlooks the poten-
tial to engage the multiple narratives of Basque culture as productive and pivotal ele-
ments in negotiating the GMB’s own identity within the social relations of its tempo-
ral and spatial context. Rather than positioning Gehry’s work as an embodiment of
what is quintessentially American, Goldberger considers it “a metaphor for Basque
culture and the relationship it aspires to have with the world: a thing apart, yet entire-
ly willing to make a connection on its own terms” (1997, 53).
Thus, the mediation of the GMB’s architecture functions on two intersecting
planes of signification. First, Gehry’s project is contextualized within the tradition of
American modernist architecture (specifically, Frank Lloyd Wright’s work and the
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York) while creating its own iconic status
as a cultural landmark. The globalization of the Guggenheim image, mediated
through architecture, facilitates the transfer of cultural capital from the institutional
and cultural context of New York to Bilbao, and in return, of economic capital from
Bilbao back to New York (i.e., through the licensing agreements for the satellite).
Second, the GMB gains its site-specific identity as a result of its location within
Bilbao’s urban space, which is promotionally inscribed with the Guggenheim image.
Seen strictly as two distinct modes of representation, the museum can operate either
as a signifier of U.S. culture (both architecturally and institutionally) or of Bilbao’s
urban culture (as an expression of regional cultural politics). Although the Guggen-
heim’s promotional strategies may switch modes of representation depending upon
the audiences (or markets) addressed, my discussion of the cultural politics of the
SRGF and the regional status of the GMB reveals that the project involves the negotia-
tion of the foundation’s interests as well as those of the Biscay government. The inter-
section of image, content, and context exposes the paradoxes in attempting to define
the project as quintessentially either American or Basque. In this sense, the attempt to
signify the GMB as “American” (i.e., U.S.) or Basque signals the project’s inherent
contradictions and cultural displacement (i.e., it can neither be exclusively signified as
“American” or “Basque”).
Yet it is precisely the (re-)negotiation and critical interrogation of these paradoxical
relations between the GMB and the SRGF that could form the basis for creating the
GMB’s own unique contribution as a hybrid museum. The sense of cultural displace-
ment emanating from the institutional interests of the SRGF’s administrative and cu-
ratorial control, on the one hand, and the attempt of the Biscay government to estab-
lish the GMB as a platform for indigenous culture and economic development, on the
other, could be employed to engage local communities as well as visitors in examining
their own relations to the museum project. Exhibitions and cultural programs devel-
 The Sponsored Museum 185

oped by the GMB might thematize and investigate these tensions, integrating them
into the museum project itself.

Berlin—New York
Another Guggenheim satellite, the Deutsche Guggenheim Berlin (DGB), reinscribes
the Guggenheim family history, national identity, and corporate cultural politics with-
in the context of the museum.4 Here, the strategy of naming, that is, designating the
“Deutsche Guggenheim Berlin,” performs multiple functions within the promotional
signification of the museum (1) by linking German national identity with the new
capital, (2) by reinscribing the Guggenheim name within the German context of the
family’s “roots,” and (3) by simultaneously, and ambiguously, identifying the site of the
museum within the Deutsche Bank headquarters in Berlin. In a special page of its Web
site titled Museum History, the Guggenheim and the Deutsche Bank provide a joint
statement (i.e., press release) designed to document, interweave, and legitimize their
respective interests in German culture through family and institutional narratives:
“Deutsche Bank has a long history of supporting the arts,” notes Mr. Rolf Breuer,
Spokesman of the Board of Managing Directors of Deutsche Bank AG. “Deutsche
Guggenheim Berlin represents the opportunity to reach a wider audience than ever be-
fore. The outstanding exhibitions to be held there will stand as a mark of our commit-
ment to quality.”

The text then links European and U.S. cultural traditions more explicitly:
The ties between the Guggenheim Museum and Germany are far-reaching. The Gug-
genheim family traces its origins to the city of Frankfurt, and Hilla Rebay, the first di-
rector of the museum, emigrated to New York from Prussia. The Guggenheim has a
strong representation of German works in its collection and has organized a number
of important exhibitions devoted to German artists, including Josef Albers, Georg
Baselitz, and Joseph Beuys.5

In some respects, however, the emergence of the DGB had less to do with family
roots or German artists in the New York collection than with the coalescence of U.S.-
German cultural politics, corporate promotion, and Thomas Krens’s globalization
strategy. In 1993, the U.S. ambassador to Germany, Richard Holbrooke, asked Krens
to develop a cultural exchange program in Berlin. According to Krens, Holbrooke
“pointed out that it might be a nice gesture to leave something behind,” Krens added,
“like a new Guggenheim” (quoted in Cowell 1997). Understood in this context, “a
new Guggenheim” symbolized the parting “gift” of U.S. culture to mark the end of
the Cold War (Cowell 1997). But the Guggenheim as a cultural marker “left behind”
in the urban topography of the new German capital also facilitated the cultural poli-
tics of U.S.-German relations by employing it as an image of that which is both Ameri-
can and German while concealing the paradoxes and conflicts, both past and present,
in the nations’ relations. The Guggenheim is signified not only as a U.S. cultural icon
186 The Sponsored Museum

(associated with Frank Lloyd Wright’s building and the New York cultural scene) but
also as representative of the Guggenheim family’s ties to German culture and art, the
museum’s extensive collection of European works, and the historical significance of
Berlin. Configured in this light, the Guggenheim is a cultural signpost designed to
commemorate the legacy of U.S.-German cultural relations at the end of the Cold
War while pointing to the new German capital. Like the promotion of the GMB, the
promotional signification of the DGB reveals a sort of code switching between the
German and U.S. modes of representation. However, switching the code, paradoxi-
cally, facilitates the actual conflation or merger of what it expressly attempts to achieve
(i.e., an institution that claims distinctive German and U.S. cultural traditions). In
doing so, a more uniform globalization is invoked, one that blurs these cultural differ-
ences and histories and effectively short-circuits any possibility of allowing the ten-
sions between cultural identity and history to become a part of constructing the DGB
as a museum or of employing them in order to engage visitors.
Moreover, the DGB’s ultimate address, in the Deutsche Bank headquarters located
at Unter den Linden, in the heart of the capital of the former GDR, alludes to the
economic and cultural conquest over the East, referred to by Alan Cowell as the “new
U.S. sector in Berlin” (1997). Krens had conceived of a permanent exhibition space in
Berlin, which materialized after he met Hilmar Kopper of the Deutsche Bank in 1996
and they subsequently agreed to establish a museum gallery in the bank’s new Berlin
headquarters in 1997. Promotional material for the DGB highlights the importance of
the Deutsche Bank site within the historical center of the “old” Berlin and as a site of
commercial, cultural, and political representation in the “new” Berlin: “located at the
intersection of Unter den Linden and Charlottenstrasse, two of the most historically
significant streets in Berlin” (Guggenheim Web site).6 Banks (e.g., Dresdner Bank at
Pariser Platz and Deutsche Bank at Unter den Linden), hotels (the new Adlon at
Pariser Platz), embassies, and government agencies dominate the urban spaces and
intersections of cultural politics in the new center. That space marking the termina-
tion of Unter den Linden at Pariser Platz, designed to represent Germany’s symbolic
entryway into the capital at the Brandenburg Gate, demarcates commercial and po-
litical interests not only through its representative structures but also through its es-
tablishment as an exclusionary space from which “undesirable” pedestrians and street
vendors are ejected.7
Thus, the signification of the DGB by the Guggenheim Foundation and by the
Deutsche Bank functions within temporal and spatial axes. Historically, it establishes
the meaning of U.S.-German cultural relations through the narrative of patronage
provided by the Guggenheim family and the institutionalized promotion of German
culture, mediated by the Guggenheim museums. In terms of a politics of space, the
DGB physically and symbolically expresses the interests of corporate capital (and
property development) in the center of the “new Berlin” and legitimizes them by fus-
ing the Deutsche Bank’s headquarters with the cultural status of the museum. By join-
ing the words “Deutsch(e),” “Guggenheim,” and “Berlin,” the naming of the muse-
 The Sponsored Museum 187

um becomes the ultimate signifier of cultural, national, and corporate identities. More-
over, the interests of the museum and its corporate sponsors (Deutsche Telekom,
Hugo Boss, and Lufthansa) are concretized in the curatorial practice of exhibitions.
In 1997, the Deutsche Bank and the SRGF commissioned James Rosenquist’s The
Swimmer in the Econo-mist (1997–98), a site-specific artwork integrating subjects of
economy, industry, and consumerism in postunification Germany. For the exhibition,
Hugo Boss recreated Rosenquist’s paper suit, which he wore to 1960s pop art open-
ings, in a “superdurable” DuPont Tyvek, in a limited-edition design sold exclusively
through the DGB.8

Image Politics
The Guggenheim’s globalization (of its collections and administrative apparatus) and
the reproduction of its image (with regional foci) indicate a simultaneous internation-
alization of museum exhibitions combined with forms of regional specialization. Both
of these processes reflect a complex network of homogenizing and differentiating ten-
dencies associated with globalization (Waters 1996, 139). The global expansion, mar-
keting, and touristic consumption of the collections are facilitated by the instrumen-
talization, mediation, and dissemination of the Guggenheim image. And all of this
occurs through collaborations with its major sponsors as a form of image transfer be-
tween museums and sponsors.9
A prominent example of image transfer and dissemination is the Guggenheim’s
agreement with fashion designer Hugo Boss. The Guggenheim provides artworks
from its collections and a Guggenheim library (books, videos, CD-ROMs about art)
for the Hugo Boss corporate offices in Stuttgart, and, most importantly, it allows the
use of its name in connection with Boss’s sponsoring activities. In return, the Gug-
genheim receives substantial financial assistance for several exhibitions to tour each
year, beginning at the Guggenheim museums in New York and then moving on to
Venice and Bilbao (Zipf 1997, 36). In addition to a Hugo Boss Prize ($50,000), the
corporation works with the Guggenheim to plan educational outreach activities for
children. Likewise, the Guggenheim develops workshops for Hugo Boss employees
designed to stimulate creativity through appreciation of the visual arts (Zipf 1997, 37).
By associating itself with Hugo Boss, the Guggenheim links its image to a post-
modernism of visual consumption, that is, of contemporary fashion, irony, and a cos-
mopolitan lifestyle. In this sense, the Guggenheim employs strategies of visual imme-
diacy and stylistic provocation used in lifestyle and fashion advertising. These strategies
are particularly apparent in the work of artist Matthew Barney, who created highly
stylized, provocative tableaus and was awarded the Hugo Boss Prize (by a jury of mu-
seum curators, which normally includes Guggenheim director Thomas Krens).10 In a
series from The March of the Anal Sadistic Warrior (1995), Barney used the facade of
“fashion-as-packaging” for his critique of institutionalized power (e.g., in sports)
(Zipf 1997, 37). Recognizing the visual power of social provocation in promotion
(e.g., in Benetton advertising), Hugo Boss, through the Hugo Boss Prize, appropriates
188 The Sponsored Museum

Barney’s social and visual provocation as a medium for projecting its own image (Zipf
1997, 37).
However, artists also participate in the promotion of the museum for their own
self-promotion. At the opening of his new show at the Guggenheim in 1995, artist
Ross Bleckner wore a new Hugo Boss suit. In 1998, counterculture icon Dennis
Hopper (Easy Rider) signed a contract with Hugo Boss to promote the clothing line
and appeared promptly thereafter at the Hugo Boss Prize ceremony in the Guggen-
heim Museum. Grasskamp points out that the context was suitably ironic, for it co-
incided with the Guggenheim’s exhibition The Art of the Motorcycle sponsored by
BMW. Grasskamp identifies an increasing trend since the early 1980s among artists to
rent or sell their works or bodies as promotional spaces (1998, 84–85). Whereas Andy
Warhol called attention to the erasure of the boundaries between advertising and art
and simultaneously retained control over the production of his work by establishing
himself as a marketing and promotional entrepreneur, artists and performers such as
Bleckner or Hopper simply rent their status as celebrities for their own promotion
and that of the advertiser. In this sense, they have become subcontractors for a global
museum that also leases or franchises its name for local image promotion.
The “promotional transfer” (Wernick 1991, 111) effected between the Guggenheim
and Hugo Boss involves a role reversal. The museum is profiled as a fashion and
trendsetter with a sense of sophisticated style (targeted to younger, culturally sophisti-
cated, affluent audiences) while the corporation is projected as an arbiter, filter, and
reservoir of cultural goods. The nexus is complete when the role of the artist is in-
voked through prizes and exhibitions in order to instrumentalize associations of crea-
tivity both for the museum and the corporation. Indeed, artists are actually integrated
into this process as participants in their own right, becoming a part of a triangulation
of promotional interests that mutually reinforce one another.

Postunification Cultural Politics

Thus, the globalization of the Guggenheim, both institutionally and symbolically, op-
erates simultaneously within the realm of local cultural politics, national identities,
and global corporate interests. Whereas the Guggenheim New York confers Bilbao
with the prestige of its own museum as a major force in urban and regional culture,
the DGB trades on the cultural currency of Berlin and the image of the Guggenheim
name within the European cultural marketplace. Berlin (and the Deutsche Bank) in-
vests the Guggenheim with the prestige of its new site as a European political and cul-
tural center. Krens conceded that “we will play a very modest role in the cultural life
of this community [Berlin]. . . . But it will be an active role, and it will be fun” (quot-
ed in Cowell 1997).
However, it could also be argued that the promotion of the Guggenheim image
attempts to contribute to Berlin’s status as an international cultural capital. Indeed,
such efforts to consolidate its legitimation and rank as a global corporate, political,
and cultural center between western and eastern Europe may be seen as an attempt to
 The Sponsored Museum 189

Figure 6.3. Purchasing a piece of celebrity: The Art of the Motorcycle in the Guggenheim’s Internet store.

resolve the historical and spatial ambiguities of Berlin (as a space claimed by contest-
ing social and ideological interests). Berlin became a focal point for German cultural
politics (in particular, under Gerhard Schröder’s State Minister for Cultural Affairs
Michael Naumann), for example, in the debate over the Holocaust Memorial. By
shifting the programmatic emphasis to Berlin as the “new center,” Gemany’s cultural
politics cannot avoid these conflicts and ambiguities—both past and present—nor
can it circumvent its tentative status as “work in progress.” Again, such tensions could
be employed to reinvigorate a dialogue on contesting forces and images of social and
cultural relations embedded in Germany rather than instrumentalizing them as pro-
motional packaging for what former Foreign Minister Klaus Kinkel called Unter-
nehmen Deutschland (“Corporate Germany”) (1996, 10).

Privatizing the Museum: “Postutopian Cultural Politics”

Volkswagen and the Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg
The fusion of regional, national, corporate, and institutional identities is indicative of
cultural politics in postunification Germany. Economic privatization; reduced budgets
190 The Sponsored Museum

for public theaters, symphonies, or museums; the debates on the new capital in
Berlin; and attempts to redefine German foreign cultural policy and images of nation-
al identity (e.g., Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s Wrapped Reichstag) are all symptomatic
of shifts in the relations among cultural institutions, audiences, artists, and corpora-
tions. The Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg (KMW), opened in 1994, is a paradigmatic ex-
ample of the museum’s function in representing history, regional identity, and corpo-
rate cultural politics—in particular, the pivotal role of the KMW in mediating the
sociopolitical interests of Volkswagen and the city of Wolfsburg.
The political and economic interests of Wolfsburg and Volkswagen are inextrica-
bly linked. Unlike the Deutsche Guggenheim Berlin, which integrates the dual signi-
fication of national and corporate identities into its name through the designation
“Deutsch(e),” the associations between Volkswagen and Wolfsburg are already em-
bedded in German history, technology, and product culture (e.g., the “Wolfsburg edi-
tion” of the VW Jetta automobile). During the latter half of the twentieth century,
Wolfsburg and Volkswagen were synonymous in the consciousness of most Germans.
The equation “Wolfsburg = Volkswagen” was a result of the politics of National
Socialism, which established the city by decree in 1938, calling it “die Stadt des KdF
[Kraft-durch-Freude]-Wagens bei Fallersleben” (“the city of the strength-through-joy
automobile near Fallersleben”). Promotional literature on VW and the city make no
mention of its original name or function, only referring parenthetically to the found-
ing date and its later renaming for the castle Wolfsburg.11
The subsequent success of Ferdinand Porsche’s Volkswagen as a German and
American cultural icon (through the early 1970s) established a generally positive prod-
uct image and gradually erased the connotations of its origins within National So-
cialism. Yet Wolfsburg has remained a company town in the sense that cultural, mu-
nicipal, and regional politics are linked to Volkswagen interests. Wolfsburg also marks
the process of postwar reindustrialization and urbanization that contributed to the
changing composition of the German workforce, especially the influx of foreign
“guest workers” (Gastarbeiter) who provided a pool of manual laborers in construction
and manufacturing. As we have seen, labor relations remain a key component of cor-
porate cultural politics in general. For corporations like Volkswagen, which maintain
a large industrial force composed of significant numbers of non-German employees,
labor relations have become a vital component of municipal and corporate politics.12
Although the reimaging of the Volkswagen product occurred rapidly (from the NS
“Kraft-durch-Freude” car, to the fun-loving “Beetle” of 1960s popular culture in Dis-
ney’s movie Herbie or the symbol of 1960s antimaterialistic, student counterculture, to
the New Beetle of the late 1990s), the reimaging of the city of Wolfsburg was quite a bit
more difficult. Wolfsburg’s history—signified first as a site for workers’ barracks and
factories and later as one of geographic isolation and proximity to the German-
German border—contributed to the perception, internally and externally, of cultural
isolation and an island mentality, despite public-relations efforts to profile it as
a crossroads between east and west.13 However, German unification changed the
 The Sponsored Museum 191

sociopolitical and economic geography of Germany as well as Wolfsburg’s position

within that geography. The KMW project coincided with a shift in the city’s proximity
to the new center of German political power—that is, to Berlin, the new capital—and
a concurrent reconfiguration of cultural identities within postunification Germany.
Thus, Wolfsburg’s relocation on the map of a unified Germany also facilitated its cul-
tural and economic reconfiguration regionally and internationally within the EU.
The museum concept was designed to trade on the international reputation of
Volkswagen and establish its collections and exhibitions accordingly:
When an industrial enterprise of VW’s calibre becomes involved with contemporary
art and culture, this new connection will presumably attract world-wide attention. It is
precisely this fact that commits the new museum from the very beginning to a quality
level that can stand up to high international standards. A regional outlook would be
doomed to failure in a place like this. (Haenlein 1994, 25)

This concept statement by Carl Haenlein (chief consultant for the project) illustrates
the extent to which Volkswagen’s interests were the primary force behind the museum
and indicates that the legitimacy of these interests were accepted a priori.
Unlike other cities, Wolfsburg had a source of funding (Volkswagen) at a time when
public arts funding was being slashed in Germany. The KMW project was one of the
last major museums to be opened in Germany before the end of the century.14 What
made it remarkable, in terms of postwar German cultural politics, is that it was large-
ly privately financed.
Two foundations generated the capital for the construction of the museum and its
ongoing administrative costs. In 1986–87, the Kunststiftung Volkswagen was created
by Volkswagen AG and the City of Wolfsburg in order to provide a nonprofit vehicle
for the subsequent distribution of earnings from the Holler Stiftung (as per the wish-
es of Asta Holler). The Holler Stiftung (established in 1990 with a capital of DM 360
million) was based on the investments and estates of Christian and Asta Holler, prin-
ciple owners of the Holler Group and the Volkswagen-Versicherungsdienst GmbH
(VVD) in Wolfsburg, which sold and marketed VW auto insurance on a contractual
basis through dealerships (primarily in western Europe and Brazil).15 Asta Holler re-
quired that 40 percent of the earnings of the Holler Stiftung (after adminstrative ex-
penses) be transferred to the Volkswagen Art Foundation (Kunststiftung Volkswagen),
whose primary objective would be to promote art and culture in Wolfsburg by fund-
ing a museum and a collection of contemporary art. Other revenue sources included a
single grant from Volkswagen AG for DM 5 million, financial support from the City
of Wolfsburg (including the donation of city-owned property for the museum), con-
tributions from the heir of a major VW importer in Italy and a Swiss importer, and
other individual or corporate donors (Schow 1994, 105). The Holler Stiftung provided
major funding for the construction of the museum (DM 70 million), for operational
costs, and for collection development. In addition, the Holler Group negotiated bank
credit for the building project (Schow 1994, 105).
192 The Sponsored Museum

Although the KMW remains the exception to the rule in the German museum
scene, it is nevertheless indicative of funding schemes for future museum projects that
now rely more heavily on corporate and private donors (e.g., the Pinakothek der
Moderne in Munich). The KMW project also reflects the new realities of German
cultural politics based on privatization and public-private agreements. Yet even with-
out the formalization of such agreements, there is increasing consensus regarding the
legitimacy of private and corporate funding for culture. In his comments about the
development of the KMW project, Haenlein writes,
the need to be informed about Beuys and Baselitz, Merz and Warhol, Matisse and
Picasso is rapidly becoming a requirement that is assuming a political dimension. VW’s
foundation of the Wolfsburg Kunstmuseum must be seen in this light. One of the
largest industrial enterprises in the Western world—its products have a decisive influ-
ence on modern life and habits—is associating itself with contemporary fine art. This
museum . . . is in a position to show that modern technology (the VW enterprise) and
contemporary culture (the museum) have a common source, creative human beings.
(1994, 25)

This approach is reminiscent of the image transfer from sponsored culture to the cor-
poration and back again that has become the centerpiece of sponsoring strategies.
Again, we see that corporate identity is defined through technological innovation
linked to the artists’ creativity: “Their imagination provides the impetus for develop-
ments in the technological and cultural spheres. This is a basis for structures that will
enable VW to be identified with contemporary art and Wolfsburg to be identified
with the new museum” (25). Artistic innovation becomes the medium of product de-
sign in a postmodern marketplace that stylizes the commodified product. Yet the ef-
fects of mass commodification, standardization, or the history of the automobile
manufacturer and its labor relations—which have had a considerable impact on West-
ern society since 1945—are omitted from this description of the relationships among
culture, the corporation, and society.
The KMW is envisioned spatially and temporally as “a gateway to the late 20th
century” (Hackelsberger 1994, 42) and designed to provide a focal point for the urban
expansion of Wolfsburg. The structure assumes a prominent visual position in defin-
ing the otherwise unremarkable skyline of the city (Hackelsberger 1994, 40). Estab-
lishing the museum as an integral component of the city center (augmenting the ex-
pansion of the town hall) recognizes and validates culture as an essential element of
urbanization. In terms of a politics of space, the museum also provides a site for the
mediation of corporate and city marketing within an area that had been perceived as a
public space in the city center.
As a medium for corporate communication and city marketing, the KMW facili-
tates the fusion of the signifiers “Volkswagen” and “Kunstmuseum.” The KMW’s
“pink-whale” logo, like the Beetle, becomes a ubiquitous symbol of Wolfsburg’s con-
temporary cultural scene. Unlike the potentially negative connotations of automobile
 The Sponsored Museum 193

manufacturing, the associations evoked by the pink whale are positive and environ-
mentally friendly. Moreover, the new KMW was envisioned as “a focal point for
Wolfsburg’s intellectual and spiritual life” (Haenlein 1994, 30). The museum func-
tioned as an institutional anchor and center for the coordination and staging of cul-
ture. As such, it provided a center for new development and also became one of the
driving forces of urbanization in Wolfsburg.
The museum as a filter, stage, or locus of cultural production in Wolfsburg—and
the way it promotes the interests of Volkswagen and the city—was illustrated in a spe-
cial exhibition Italienische Metamorphose: 1949–1968 (Italian Metamorphosis: 1949–1968)
at the KMW. A multidisciplinary presentation of Italian art, design, fashion, jewelry,
photography, and architecture provided a documentation of the growing importance
of Italian culture within Europe and globally. Italian product design, fashion, film,
and cuisine and the notion of Italy as the embodiment of la dolce vita for German
tourism—all left an imprint on contemporary culture. Although the exhibition un-
doubtedly documented the international influence of Italian culture, it simultaneous-
ly functioned as a promotional vehicle for municipal and corporate (labor) relations
vis-à-vis the spatial and symbolic axis of Italy-Wolfsburg-Volkswagen.
A summer of cultural programs, the Italian Summer in Wolfsburg, coordinated by
the cultural affairs department of the city (as well as by local museums, galleries, and
the Italian Cultural Institute located in Wolfsburg) reinforced the thematic emphases
of the exhibition through films, performances, and lectures. However, the actual
meaning of the cultural events for the city and VW becomes clear in the cultural af-
fairs director’s reference to the significance of Italy and Italian workers in Wolfsburg:
For many years a soft breeze of southern culture has billowed through the rather cool
industrial city of Wolfsburg. Due to its traditionally high proportion of Italian workers,
Wolfsburg is often called one of the largest Italian enclaves north of the Alps. For
decades Wolfsburg has been happy to live with these fellow citizens.16

The trope of exotic southern culture (südländische Kultur) is reinscribed within the
context of Wolfsburg and Volkswagen. Although the cultural and economic relations
among Italy, Wolfsburg, and Volkswagen presumably provide the impetus for the ex-
hibition and the Italian Summer, it is precisely the nature of these relations that the
cultural programs fail to explore. The history of German-Italian relations within the
specific context of Wolfsburg and with respect to the lives and social realities of Italian
workers in the city could have made a productive contribution to understanding
“Italy” as it relates to the social fabric of its reception in Wolfsburg.17
The convergence and coordination of cultural politics in Wolfsburg is revealed by
the way the three entities either share or assume functions previously within the do-
main of their partners. The KMW provided the stage for fashion designer Wolfgang
Joop to present his fall/winter collection. Television personality Alfred Biolek was
moderator for the show in the museum’s foyer. In addition to “Joop!” posters and
T-shirts, the KMW presented an exhibition of Joop’s own drawings. The museum also
194 The Sponsored Museum

Figure 6.4. Exhibiting Italy at the KMW: La dolce vita for Italians in Wolfsburg?

distributed free samples of Joop! perfume to visitors during the course of the exhibi-
tion. The issue here is not whether museums should include fashion as culture, for it
certainly is a significant force in contemporary culture, but rather the extent to which
museums cooperate with designers (e.g., Guggenheim and Hugo Boss or the Haus der
Kunst and Karl Lagerfeld) in providing sites for events that promote consumer prod-
ucts and in return promote the museum “product” through celebrity personalities.
I suggest that these events also provide the opportunity to address visitors in terms
of their own positions as “consumers” of various forms of culture, be it in the context
of the museum or the shopping mall. For example, such an exhibition might also ask
visitors to consider various modes of consumption and aesthetic experience with re-
spect to how and why they “consume” the Joop exhibition, his fashions, or other
products. To a certain extent, these events, primarily oriented to visual or sensual re-
 The Sponsored Museum 195

ception, within urban centers have become a prevalent form of postmodern tourism
(Urry 1995, 148–49).
The experiential link (Erlebnis) between product, image, and cultural event was a
motivation for Volkswagen’s sponsorship of the Rolling Stones Voodoo Lounge tour,
as well as for prior tours by Genesis and Pink Floyd.18 With respect to cultural politics
in Wolfsburg, Volkswagen was able to score a public relations coup by bringing the
Rolling Stones to Wolfsburg to perform at the factory’s immense parking lot under
the VW logo. The parking lot became the venue for the production of event culture
and the reinforcement of a positive corporate image within the ranks of its employees
locally, while the Stones sponsorship is deployed globally by VW public relations as a
medium for improving sales and thereby ensuring jobs:
It’s important for us to achieve international synergy. Therefore our strategy is based on
cooperation with groups that have an international standing and simultaneously reach
several generations. When it’s a matter of increasing sales and ensuring market share
and, as a result, jobs, then we say “Think big!”19

Postutopian Cultural Politics

The convergence and de-differentiation of institutional interests within public and
corporate cultural politics points to what Schulze has referred to as postutopian cul-
tural politics in Germany (1992, 524–26). From the 1950s to the early 1990s, Ger-
many pursued a “utopian” orientation with the objective of pluralistic participation.
Schulze traces the evolution to postutopian positions in terms of the variation, evolu-
tion, and repetition of the following interrelated motifs: (1) the representation and
mediation of high culture during the 1950s; (2) the democratization and popularization
of high culture for “the masses” (e.g., Hilmar Hoffmann’s notion of “Culture for every-
one” [“Kultur für alle”] in the 1960s and 1970s); (3) a sociocultural orientation that
addressed individual identity and diverse social milieus through pedagogical programs
and also accepted the legitimacy of historical everyday culture during the 1980s; (4) eco-
nomic orientations that legitimized culture as part of an urban infrastructure designed
to attract industry, jobs, and tourism during the 1980s and 1990s. Schulze argues that
the consensus that defined and organized public cultural politics in terms of democra-
tization, diversification, education, or public good have been gradually replaced by
the economics of market acceptance, which validate democratization and public ap-
proval. Economic rationales, although secondary in many cases, are therefore accepted
as a legitimate objective of cultural politics (1992, 500–501).
Werner Heinrichs suggests that fierce regional competition among cities in Ger-
many and the EU has led to higher investments in city-marketing programs, in which
museums assume a high-profile position, while other cultural programs are reduced or
eliminated. (Heinrichs 1994, 346–47, 350). Local funding for arts and culture in the
United States during the 1990s has also led to a growing gap between urban and rural
funding for cultural programs, not only because the tax base of rural areas is small but
196 The Sponsored Museum

also because corporations select projects in areas where their interests are most vital
and visible—a factor that has also excluded low-income urban areas from sponsored
culture (Larson 1997, 159).
For Schulze, postutopian thinking in cultural politics represents a transition from
offensive to defensive strategies. The defensive position is less concerned with forces
outside the institutional spectrum of cultural-political activity than with the internal
forces of (self-)destruction that operate under the guise of making constructive
progress (1992, 528–29). Certainly Schulze is correct in suggesting that the forces of
change are emanating from within systems of cultural politics, for the spectrum of
participants has expanded to include many who were previously considered on the
outside—most notably corporations as well as cultural consultants and managers.
Corporations, working with management consultants and public-relations agencies
specializing in cultural programming, have collectively institutionalized cultural poli-
tics in their own right while establishing cooperative agreements with public and pri-
vate institutions. Sociopolitical rationales are increasingly subordinated to economic
rationales (e.g., public approval is based on tickets sold), which can be used to validate
legitimacy and maintain or expand institutional interests (Schulze 1992, 529). If a con-
vergence of corporate and public cultural politics, based on a consensus of the eco-
nomic rationale, leads to their functional integration, then, Schulze asks, “What is the
point of [public] cultural politics?” (529). Indeed, the lines between questions of pub-
lic and corporate interests in culture, which would not be primarily dependent upon
the economic rationales of market success, have become increasingly blurred.

Corporate Museums: BMW and Vitra

The conceptualization of foreign cultural policy as “Corporate Germany” (Klaus
Kinkel) and the proliferation of sponsorships indicate that Germany is indeed in the
process of transition to a postutopian cultural politics. This is a system that increas-
ingly resembles strategies in the United Kingdom and the United States, which have
established networks of corporate cultural politics. However, corporate programs of
cultural politics must also continually redefine themselves, even in opposition to their
own past programs, in order to differentiate themselves within a marketplace of events
and experiences. As corporations operate in their cultural mode and institutions as-
sume corporate strategies, it is more crucial than ever for audiences and communities
to recognize the interests of those involved in these systems. Part of this process in-
volves mapping the positions of the participants within systems of cultural produc-
tion, which, seemingly, do not distinguish between “inside” and “outside.”
One of the institutions that inverts notions of public and corporate culture is the
corporate museum. Initially, many corporate museums were literally depots where ar-
tifacts dealing with product or corporate history could simultaneously be stored and
displayed for interested visitors. Using the corporate museum as an important promo-
tional and public-relations vehicle was frequently an afterthought rather than a result
of corporate strategic planning. Such museums were also a product of the international
 The Sponsored Museum 197

boom in museums and growing public interest in everyday culture, beginning in the
1980s.
In her extensive analysis of German corporate museums, Anne Mikus characterizes
the corporate museum as a “transitional form within the [corporate] communications
mix, between the segments ‘sponsoring’ and ‘advertising’” (1997, 225). Clearly, the ex-
panded notion of the museum provided an opening for corporate museums to utilize
the positive image of public museums in order to promote the cultural role of the cor-
poration and its products. As hybrids within the museum landscape, corporate muse-
ums, like many other museums, defy simple categorization. Mikus suggests a broad
definition of the corporate museum as “a permanent collection presented as an exhibi-
tion, founded and maintained by a corporation” (1997, 15).20 Despite many similar or
overlapping functions, Mikus distinguishes corporate museums from corporate ar-
chives, collections held by corporate chief executives, corporate collections (which may
or may not be publically loaned or exhibited), art collections used primarily for interior
decoration, and some corporate galleries (to the extent that they rely on external, tem-
porary exhibitions) (1997, 17–18).
Although corporate museums vary in size, contents, and curatorial practices, most
focus on representations of the firm through its products (e.g., auto museums) or sci-
entific and technological innovation. Yet even these representations of product culture
are often mediated through sophisticated exhibitions that address the sociocultural
contexts and interrelationships of culture and product technologies—albeit frequent-
ly from an affirmative stance. The BMW Museum and the Vitra Design Museum
present two examples of the corporate museum’s function within the museum land-
scape, as a part of the redefinition of cultural politics, and in mediating social history
and culture. Unlike museums in general, many corporate museums contextualize
consumer products (e.g., BMW automobiles and Vitra chairs) within the actual site
of production (adjacent to factories and administrative facilities). Yet they simultane-
ously decontextualize their products by transforming them into museum artifacts and
selectively creating new contexts. The way these processes of contextualizing and de-
contextualizing occur relates to their politics of representation and the curatorial prac-
tices employed—in these two instances—in very different ways.

The BMW Museum: Back to the Future II

Like Volkswagen’s organization of the Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg project, the BMW
Museum and the Vitra Design Museum relate to the mediation of history through in-
dustrial products and to notions of mobility and place. History, mobility, and place
provide the thematic foci for the design of the BMW Museum and its exhibition
strategies. This is underscored in its brochure The BMW Museum Experience, which
promises 300,000 visitors annually a “one of a kind” experience and ranks itself as
“a fixture of Munich culture” equal to the city’s other leading museums—that is, the
Deutsches Museum and the Neue Pinakothek (2–3, 15).21 The reader is told that the
museum is one of the city’s most popular venues and an integral part of metropolitan
198 The Sponsored Museum

and regional culture: “This is hardly surprising for its holistic approach and aesthetic
design are a reflection of its surroundings: in this south German metropolis, nature,
technology, science, culture and art are all closely intertwined, and always have been.”22
The museum itself is located at the base of BMW’s corporate headquarters and fac-
tory (near the “futuristic” Olympic Village and Park) in a titanium structure, which
has been compared to a large, windowless silver bowl, next to the “four-cylinder” ad-
ministrative high-rise. Founded in 1968 as part of the design for a new headquarters
building, which would capitalize on the 1972 Olympics and the architecture of the
Olympic Park, the museum was conceived primarily as an exhibition area for docu-
menting BMW’s history. However, the heavy tourist traffic to the Olympic Park after
the 1972 Games also led to unanticipated numbers of visitors to the BMW museum
(opened in 1973) and its subsequent reconceptualization in 1979 as a museum that pre-
sented the automobile from a sociotechnological perspective.23

Figure 6.5. The BMW Museum: history, mobility, and a sense of place.
 The Sponsored Museum 199

BMW engaged the Emmy- and Oscar Award–winning film designer Rolf Zehet-
bauer (Cabaret, Inside the Third Reich (TV), The Boat, and The Never-Ending Story),
writer-filmmaker George Morse, designer Charlotte Krings, engineer Gunter Spur,
and sociologist Hans Martin Bolte to coordinate several films and a state-of-the-art
multimedia exhibition. Successive exhibitions and films integrated BMW’s role as a
major historical force in technological and social development. Unlike the older
AutoMuseum Volkswagen (in Wolfsburg), which is primarily a display of automobiles
in a large hall preceded by vitrines documenting VW history,24 the BMW museum
was designed by a team of filmmakers, engineers, designers, and sociologists who an-
ticipated the need to represent the corporation as a legitimate and integral component
of social and cultural life. By packaging the BMW narrative in an interactive, multi-
media format, the designers also created a successful tourist attraction.25
Each exhibition (accompanied by a growing number of multimedia and inter-
active displays) addressed time, space, and mobility in terms of automobiles (especial-
ly BMW’s), technology, and society. Each of the titles for the successive exhibitions
linked these elements: Zeitsignale (Signals of Time) (1979–84); Zeitmotor (Motors of
Time) (1984–90); and Zeithorizont (Time Horizons) (1991–present). “Mobility in the
flow of time,” an overriding theme of Zeithorizont, provides a conceptual leitmotiv for
the recurring significance of the BMW automobile past, present, and future.26 Yet this
exhibition focuses on the future of the automobile, and in a broader sense of technolo-
gy, looking into the twenty-first century. In describing the conceptual development of
Zeithorizonte, the BMW public-relations information establishes three main themes
and a question:
• Quality of life is doable.
• Progress is doable.
• The future is doable.
• What kind of progress is globally legitimate, simply because it is responsible?

The rhetorical question regarding “what kind of progress” seems to be cast aside when
the text concludes,
It’s not the pressing problems—of finite resources, environmental overload, and over-
crowded transportation systems—which are preeminent, but rather dealing with them
through targeted solutions. The exhibition Zeithorizont deals with the “new normalcy”
in the thought and feelings of our time. Today people react more calmly, pragmatically,
without illusions. People believe in the future and that life will not be any less livable
tomorrow than today.27

The self-confident, affirmative tone of the public-relations text is replicated and medi-
ated within the exhibition. Videos and texts construct the relations among technolo-
gy, mobility, society, and leisure through the prism of thematic emphases, including
CAD-construction, robots, changes in the workplace, motor sports (i.e., motorcycle
200 The Sponsored Museum

Figure 6.6. Expanding our horizons: interpreting time and space through product technologies.

and automobile racing), families (roles for men and women, leisure), the automobile
of the future, precision (instrumentation), and the history of technology. Although
the videos occasionally raise a random question, such as “What is the future of the
family?” without further elaboration, they inform the viewer once again that environ-
mental and social problems can be solved through technology.28
Although BMW public relations emphasizes a nonlinear conceptual development
in the exhibition, the chronological presentation of automobiles and motorcycles be-
comes the focal point for visitors as they walk through the first three-quarters of the
exhibition. The museum building itself is structured as an upward spiral with four
platforms. Technological information and displays (e.g., manufacturing an auto-
mobile from start to finish) are interspersed with vehicles, motors, and other devices,
which are suspended from ceilings or mounted on walls in order to heighten their vi-
 The Sponsored Museum 201

sual impact. The visitor’s steady progression upwards physically reinforces the repre-
sentation of technological progress. The BMW Museum, clearly reminiscent of Frank
Lloyd Wright’s spiral in the Guggenheim, provides the dramatic stage for the presen-
tation of the BMW narrative.
However, the representation of the upward spiral of continuity (as a signifier of
progress) has become increasingly problematic as contemporary architects recognize
the importance of designing museum spaces that allow for the discontinuities and
ruptures of twentieth-century art and culture. Haenlein’s remarks (in reference to the
KMW project) characterizes this perspective:
The spiral of the Guggenheim Museum, for example, reflects historical continuity,
something like an eternal recurrence of those forces that lie behind history. . . . History
is systematized only in books—in exhibitions the wild and disorderly structure of his-
tory should remain perceptible—a chaotic element that could revitalize even the over-
administered life of modern man. (1994, 24)

The idealized space of BMW’s modified spiral mediates the coherence and continuity
of a technological progress apparently unbroken by the discontinuities of history. Al-
though social or technological ruptures (e.g., the role of BMW under National Social-
ism or the automobile and environmental issues) are integrated into the historical
stage of the exhibition, they are presented not as pivotal events and issues but, rather,
as metaphorical bumps in the road of the automobile’s progress. These discontinuities
are relativized by the visual and representational continuity of the exhibition as a
whole, which directs visitors along a single path upward, mirroring the linear path of
technological advancement and optimism described by Zeithorizont.
However, as Roger Silverstone observes, museums function in terms of multiple,
frequently overlapping logics—with respect to categorization but also with regard to
how they represent and physically structure time and space in the exhibition (1994,
168–69). Although the dominant orientation to time in the Zeithorizont exhibition
may be toward the future, the BMW Museum also looks to the past. A special exhi-
bition on the BMW Isetta, for example, rewrites history—defined as a culture of
mobility—through the postwar automobile, understood as an icon of tourism, of
lifestyle, and of the economic upward-mobility of Germany’s Economic Miracle.

The Isetta: Reconfiguring History and Identity

The fortieth birthday of the BMW Isetta in 1995 provided the opportunity for a spe-
cial retrospective exhibition (BMW Isetta: Zeitzeuge der 50er Jahre) focusing on its role
in the social context of Germany in the 1950s. The Isetta motocoupé—even smaller
than the VW Beetle—only sold 160,000 units between 1955 and 1962 and never
reached the popularity of the Beetle (which was selling 1,500 units daily during its
peak). But it was an affordable BMW for middle-class consumers and later became a
cult object for collectors.29 Although the exhibition opened with a series of promo-
tional events (e.g., parade of Isettas through Munich, competitions for collectors, a
202 The Sponsored Museum

drawing for an Isetta, a Children’s Grand Prix Race), the exhibition’s focus was not on
the automobile itself but on BMW’s documentation of the corporation’s historical
role as seen through the perspective of the Isetta.30 BMW describes the documenta-
tion as “showing the networking of corporate activity with the social contexts [that]
place the Motocoupé Isetta within the sociopolitical, technological, and everyday
context of the 1950s.”31
Each island within the exhibition takes a familiar theme as a point of departure.
The first exhibit area (island 1), entitled “The New Mobility: Fun with the Car,” epito-
mizes mobility and tourism as a lifestyle defined by the new consumer products (e.g.,
televisions, portable radios, mixers, and coffee makers) of Germany’s Economic
Miracle. At island 2 (“Technology Conquers Our Lives”), the visitor reads that the
“belief in the benefits of science and technological progress remained euphoric and
largely without criticism”; the social and cultural criticism of the 1950s are not men-
tioned here. Everyday life during the Economic Miracle (island 3) is portrayed
through the filter of nostalgia. Socioeconomic upward mobility and physical mobility
are facilitated by the German automobile industry; the VW Beetle was a promotional
icon of the boom. Lifestyle becomes nostalgia through references to furniture and de-
sign (the kidney-shaped cocktail tables [Nierentisch] or the pastel-colored Isetta), alco-
hol and fashion (VAT 69 and Cinzano), home styles (basements renovated as Party-
keller), and rock and roll (island 4). German victories in soccer and other sports (island
5) reflect national identity and a renewed self-confidence (“We Are Somebody Again—
Not Only in Soccer”). The historical narrative associates the male consumer’s interest

Figure 6.7. “Technology takes over [conquers] our lives.” Photograph by Mark W. Rectanus.
 The Sponsored Museum 203

in sports and automobiles with images of a Germany that is once again a winner.
Thus, soccer, automobiles, and the German nation are all defined by their relations to
identity and, more significantly, to power. Food, fashion, music (island 6), and vaca-
tion trips in the Isetta to “Bella Italia” (island 7) complete the picture of an increas-
ingly European lifestyle of cosmopolitanism based upon mobility and consumption.
German-Italian relations are also referenced in terms of Germany’s growing economic
prosperity and power, which drew on the Italian labor market in the latter half of the
1950s (island 3).
Finally, the construction of the Berlin Wall (1961) provides thematic closure for the
exhibition. An Isetta that was used to smuggle nine people across the border in 1964 is
included in the exhibition, on loan from the Check-Point Charlie Museum in Berlin.
As Germany becomes a divided nation and the “euphoric” 1950s yield to the political
realities of the 1960s, the Isetta is represented as a vehicle of political freedom—the
quintessential symbol of mobility defined as freedom. Of course, 1962 marked the
end of the Isetta’s production, preserving it permanently as an icon and a collectable
of the 1950s.
Thus, the curatorial practices of the Isetta exhibition relate to strategies and politics
of representation that attempt to reestablish the significance and centrality of both
product and corporation for the social context. What is at issue here is not whether cor-
porations, products, and technologies have played a role in social history but, rather,
how they mediate historical narratives in order to retell these stories. The analysis of the
Isetta exhibition within the BMW Museum illustrates the continuing function of the

Figure 6.8. Isetta, hula hoops, and sports. Photograph by Mark W. Rectanus.
204 The Sponsored Museum

automobile as one of the most potent symbols of power, leisure, consumption, mobili-
ty, freedom, and, in this case, national identity. The sense of coherence and continuity
represented symbolically in the Zeithorizont exhibition and physically in the upward
spiral of the museum itself is projected back to the historical narrative of corporate
identity during the 1950s. This is an identity that affiliates itself emotionally and politi-
cally with media symbols (hoola-hoops, rock and roll, Italy, and sports events) used as
a short hand to signify an era. The Isetta exhibition and Zeithorizont reconstruct these
codes as forms of remembering and translate them into the temporal, spatial, and po-
litical modalities of mobility. Whereas Zeithorizont focuses the visitor’s attention
forward to a “pragmatic” vision of the future, the exhibition-within-the-exhibition
(Isetta) reassures visitors of a continuous link to the past.
Silverstone points out that this process is part of the myth making inherent in the
narrative of exhibitions: “What also emerges, of course, is a particular inflection of
that myth, of necessity ideological, and in one way or another expressing a world view
which excludes or relegates to insignificance other versions of reality” (1994, 167). As
the BMW Museum positions itself with respect to the past and the future, mediated
in terms of the “present” of its exhibition, Huyssen’s notion of the museum as a site
for creative forgetting and remembering assumes even greater importance, by shifting
the emphasis to the role of the visitor (Huyssen 1995, 34–35). Silverstone also refers to
this as “the ‘curatorial’ work of the visitor in which objects are reinscribed into a per-
sonal culture of memory and experience” (1994, 165).

The Vitra Design Museum: An Anthropology of Seating

The Vitra Design Museum employs very different curatorial strategies than we have
observed at the BMW Museum. Opened in 1989, as a separate foundation established
by the furniture manufacturer Vitra, the Vitra Design Museum (VDM) immediately
distanced itself from traditional notions that corporate museums only document cor-
porate histories and products (Von Vegesack 1993, 1). Vitra has an international reputa-
tion for manufacturing chairs by leading designers of the twentieth century (Charles
and Ray Eames, George Nelson, and contemporary designs by Mario Bellini and
Dieter Thiel). The VDM was in part founded to house Vitra CEO Rolf Fehlbaum’s ex-
tensive collection of furniture and designs of major movements (Werkbund, Bauhaus,
de Stijl) and designers (from Otto Wagner and Josef Hoffmann to Gerrit Rietveld,
Charles and Ray Eames, and Robert Venturi). However, the concept evolved into much
more than simply a “chair museum.” Design became the conceptual focus for the mu-
seum and the Vitra Foundation.
A museum that makes design the centerpiece of its activities must also reflect this
awareness in the museum structure, or “container” (Ritchie 1994). Like other contem-
porary museums, Vitra recognized the importance of communicating its image through
the container of representational architecture. In keeping with its image as a cutting-
edge manufacturer of contemporary furniture, Vitra engaged architect Frank Gehry to
design his first museum in Europe (Von Vegesack 1993, 3). The collaboration with
 The Sponsored Museum 205

Gehry had begun when Vitra produced a limited edition of his Little Beaver chair
(Lawton 1994, 30). By choosing a high-profile architect, Vitra underscored its commit-
ment to design and simultaneously attracted attention within the professional design
community and the media that would promote the VDM. Vitra also showed its com-
mitment to integrating design into the everyday culture of the workplace by commis-
sioning Gehry to design a new factory. He suggested that Vitra take the process of di-
versity one step further by retaining a different architect for each new building within
the corporate complex near Weil-am-Rhein, Germany. Through the interplay of mul-
tiple design perspectives, “corporate identity was . . . boldly replaced with corporate va-
riety.” Vitra’s “corporate policy of stylistic pluralism” (Lawton 1994, 30, 34) draws at-
tention to the multifaceted interactions of space, structure, and objects within the
culture of the workplace. Unlike most corporations, Vitra has chosen to thematize the
function of its own cultural production as a focus for its corporate cultural policy.
Rather than simply instrumentalizing “design” as a promotional signifier, Vitra ex-
plores both the corporation’s relations to those who produce design and design’s func-
tion within the workplace. Simultaneously, the concept of design becomes the focus
for the Foundation and the VDM, which in turn inform the corporation’s production
through interaction with design professionals and the public.
The VDM specifically aims to “stimulate consciousness of people towards their
aesthetic environment” (Von Vegesack 1993, 1). Rather than using the museum pri-
marily as an opportunity to present its own products, Vitra hopes to promote an
awareness of individualized and collective interactions with everyday objects as a part
of culture. This focuses on but is not limited to social interaction with furniture, inte-
rior design, and architecture:
The primary task of the Museum continues to be the elucidation of the design process
in all of its phases—from the birth of the idea through the manufacture and marketing of
the completed product. And since furniture is not only perceived through an intellectual

Figure 6.9. Vitra, designing spaces.

206 The Sponsored Museum

process, but also is experienced through sensual and physical contact, we do not present
the collection purely through artworks enshrined on pedestals. So far as possible the visi-
tor is given the opportunity for direct interaction with objects through installation of re-
productions and demonstration models. (Von Vegesack 1993, 6)

By removing avant-garde designs from their “pedestals,” the VDM attempts to “coun-
teract these elitist tendencies” that make design synonymous with “styling” (Von
Vegesack 1993, 1). This objective also relates to the museum’s goal of demystifying the
aura of works (e.g., chairs by Breuer or Eames) that have achieved the cultural status
of collected art. The works’ aura is heightened through their function as museum arti-
facts. In part, the VDM exhibitions attempt to explore this dialectic between the ob-
jects as museum artifacts of high modernist sophistication and their functions within
mass production and consumption.
Vitra may illustrate a trend among many new corporate museums, relying less on
presenting permanent collections and company history than on using the museum as
a space for special exhibitions relating to the social and historical contexts of cultural
production. Like other global museums, corporate museums, such as the VDM, func-
tion as cultural promoters by sending their own exhibitions on the road to public mu-
seums, thus expanding the communicative potential of the exhibition beyond the
local site (in addition to the promotional value of sponsoring the exhibition). The
corporate museum as host and recipient for traveling exhibitions also underscores its
participation in, convergence with, and integration into global networks of museum
administration and curatorship. Vitra views its participation within such global net-
works as a nonprofit activity. For example, the VDM offers one-year internships in
design and architecture for students and professionals from eastern Europe, free con-
sulting services on museum administration and marketing for eastern European mu-
seums, and workshops with leading design professionals.32
Traveling exhibitions prepared by the VDM include The World of Charles and Ray
Eames (prepared in cooperation with the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.,
1997), Frank Lloyd Wright: The Living City (the first major European exhibition de-
voted to Wright’s architecture and applied arts, 1998), Luis Barragán (an exhibition
devoted to the Mexican architect’s work and based on the Barragán archive ac-
quired by Vitra in 1995). Thematically, the exhibitions relate to multiple and diverse
representations of culture revolving around the changing functions of design as com-
munication. This is particularly evident in the exhibition Kindermöbel: The Material
World of Childhood (opened at the Kunsthal Rotterdam in 1997), which examined
relationships between children and parents in Western, African, Asian, and Latin
American cultures. The exhibition explores how these relationships are socially struc-
tured and represented through the historical and contemporary artifacts of children’s
furniture.
The exhibit African Chairs (1994) illuminates the symbolic significance of the chair
by revealing its cultural meanings in non-Western cultures. In doing so, it provides
 The Sponsored Museum 207

the viewer with new perspectives on the representative functions of the chair in every-
day culture:
In this pioneering survey, an entirely different tradition of sitting was displayed than
that documented in the permanent collection. Westerners who can remember being
forbidden to sit in “Father’s chair” have at least a theoretical preparation for learning
that, in some parts of Africa, Father’s chair is deeply bound up with Father’s soul.
(Lawton 1994, 32)

As a cultural anthropology of “seating” practices, the exhibition makes visitors con-

scious of symbolic and communicative functions of the chair, functions related to lan-
guage, space, and architecture. Moreover, it sensitizes them to the diverse uses of the
chair as a mass-produced, utilitarian object or as a “functionless” object of art in their
own (i.e., Western) culture. Here, Gehry’s Little Beaver chair, in a limited edition of
one hundred, and the corporate executive’s leather-bound chair—a symbol of power
and a fetish object—provide examples of such diverse uses presented in other VDM
exhibitions. In assessing the collective contribution of this and other Vitra exhibi-
tions, Lawton concludes,
Evident in all these presentations is the way in which furniture echoes the society from
which it emerges. As such its function is perhaps not so different from what was re-
vealed in the African exhibition: social status is still defined by chairs . . . and our belief
systems are echoed by what we sit on. Are our chairs functional or ornate? Are they
made to last or to throw away? Do they require you to sit up straight or encourage you
to lounge around? . . . Perhaps, most important, are they designed to fit us or do they
require us to fit them? (1994, 34)

By providing “a terrain which offers multiple narratives of meaning” (Huyssen

1995, 34), African Chairs exemplifies exhibition strategies that illuminate (in a peda-
gogical sense) and stimulate what Silverstone refers to as the visitor’s “‘curatorial’
work,” which engages their own memories and experiences (Silverstone 1994, 165). Of
course, the African Chairs exhibition could be seen as simply reinscribing the exotic.
However, I argue that African Chairs engages the viewer in challenging this notion by
demystifying cultural practices—for example, by creating an awareness that, through
their representation as museum artifacts or collector’s objects, Western chairs are in-
scribed within their own histories of the exotic and with their own representations of
power and social relations.
Unlike the BMW Museum, Vitra has attempted to explore the multiple narratives
of its own products and the corporation’s implication within their social contexts of
production and consumption (e.g., by using design to question the notion of a uni-
form corporate identity at its corporate headquarters). Undoubtedly, the automobile
is more overtly linked to the symbols of power, leisure, and mobility of the twentieth
century than is the chair, whose narratives are more “hidden” but nonetheless express
these symbolic relations through their own histories. Within the BMW exhibitions
208 The Sponsored Museum

(Zeithorizont and Isetta), the automobile’s narratives of highway accidents, urbaniza-

tion, environmental pollution, or automobile tourism remain unspoken or rela-
tivized within a past defined largely as nostalgia. For BMW, the automobile is repre-
sented through the temporal and spatial axes of lifestyle, collecting, mobility, leisure/
entertainment, and technological innovation. More importantly, it is not a matter of
simply comparing what is being exhibited, that is, “automobiles” versus “chairs,” but
rather how and why, which reveals the politics of representation embedded in the ex-
hibitions. To a much greater extent than BMW, Vitra employs the multiple cultural
narratives and histories of design as a productive point of departure for its exhibition
practices and corporate cultural politics that are mediated through the museum and
foundation.
Thus, the Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, the BMW Museum, and the Vitra Design
Museum demonstrate the process of institutional and functional convergence with re-
spect to corporate and public cultural politics. They also reflect the process of hy-
bridization by assuming private or public functions and expanding the scope of their
cultural offerings. Vitra is the most striking example of this process, since the corpora-
tion thematized its own involvement in the social contexts of design through exhibi-
tion practices that are not primarily oriented to public relations or promotional events
(unlike the BMW Museum or the Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg). Of course Vitra, like
other private and public institutions, is attentive to and dependent upon public
image. However, the museum’s site, exhibitions, and image are not instrumentalized
as promotional vehicles. As a forum for design exhibitions and workshops rather than
as a promotional stage for corporate products and histories, Vitra may be an atypical
corporate museum or, as Vitra suggests, not a corporate museum at all.
Strictly in terms of promotional and administrative strategies, both the Guggen-
heim (with its global network of satellites) and the much smaller Kunstmuseum
Wolfsburg (an aggressively marketed, privatized public museum) have established
market-oriented positions very similar to those of global corporations. The Gug-
genheim has evolved into an especially significant hybrid museum. The SRGF and
Guggenheim Museum (New York) grew from a private foundation and museum into
a global entity and employed the logics of institutional (i.e., corporate) expansion into
overseas “markets” (e.g., by acquiring large collections, loaning them globally, and dis-
playing them in satellite museums) while also operating in modes similar to those of
public museums (e.g., fund-raising, education, and outreach).
The complex networks of interinstitutional cultural communication are illustrated
by the Guggenheim’s curatorial strategies. In a distinct departure from its past pro-
grams, the Guggenheim’s 1998 exhibition The Art of the Motorcycle, sponsored by
BMW, recontextualized similar themes of mobility as historical narrative that we
found manifest in the BMW Museum. Frank Gehry’s minimal installation of the
motorcycles on upward-spiraling stainless steel resembled the chrome and steel of the
engine cylinders, providing a postmodern irony to Wright’s modernist architecture
(Hyde 1998, 95). Despite a somewhat more critical edge to a “social history as seen
 The Sponsored Museum 209

through the motorcycle” than we observed in the BMW Museum’s Isetta exhibition,
the final text concludes with praise (indistinguishable from an advertisement) for its
sponsor’s latest product as an environmentally friendly, ultimately “American” motor-
cycle, the R1200C designed by David Robb:
On Robb’s quiet and efficient machine, you can cruise at 55 mph while smelling the
flowers. You can almost hear the birds singing. This is the soul of American motor-
cycling, even with a heart all BMW efficiency: shaft drive, a proven Boxer engine, and
electronic engine management. The cruiser is the flipside of [designer Miquel] Galluzi’s
grunge Monster; it is the ’90s turned green.33

James Hyde observes that in its praise of the motorcycle as an icon of freedom and re-
bellion, its more utilitarian uses (e.g., as police motorcycles) and modifications in
other (non-Western) cultural contexts were absent, making the exhibition indistin-
guishable from “a tarted-up trade show” (1998, 96). As such, the exhibition set new at-
tendance records and was also a significant marker in Krens’s efforts to expand the
Guggenheim’s image from a site for avant-garde and modernist art to one that em-
braces popular culture. Yet it also seemed to be another missed opportunity for the
museum to realize the full potential of the diversity of a popular culture that also con-
tains critical or subversive moments by failing to integrate some of its broader cultur-
al uses and to engage visitors in a consideration of them.
Although contemporary museum projects like the GMB or the Tate Modern
(which opened in 2000) have exceeded projections for new visitors (the Tate Modern
attracted a million visitors in the first six weeks alone), their contents and collections
have been increasingly subordinated to image architecture and consuming the experi-
ence of visiting the site itself. Alice Rawsthorn, in the lifestyle magazine Travel and Lei-
sure, addresses the “museum-as-theme-park” trend with some amazement in an article
titled “Museum or Amusement Park?” She writes, “In the post-Bilbao era, flashy new
museums are becoming adult theme parks. Is it the incredible art inside—or do the de-
signer restaurants and the buildings themselves have something to do with it?”34 The
article also mentions Daniel Libeskind’s Jewish Museum in Berlin, which may have
already been relegated to the “attraction” category because of the success of its structure
and apparent indecision regarding its collections.35 Indeed, both economic and politi-
cal pressures to get new audiences into new museums in the first place, so that they can
then interact with exhibitions and collections, may be relegating contents and collec-
tions to secondary status, or at least shifting the emphasis of museum visits to other
forms of visual and material consumption. In this respect, “the museum visit” has been
gradually integrated into other forms of urban consumption. Or from a different per-
spective, the reconfiguration of museum spaces primarily in terms of experiential con-
sumption has facilitated or encouraged visitors to approach the museum as they would
other sites of consumption. Although such strategies undoubtedly attract new audi-
ences and increase revenues, they also relativize the functional distinction of the muse-
um within society, the process of sociocultural de-differentiation referred to earlier.
210 The Sponsored Museum

Like the Guggenheim, the Getty Museum and Getty Trust have expanded dramati-
cally, in what may well represent a similar example of the private foundation’s impor-
tance in contemporary cultural politics. The globalization of museum collections by
major museums (such as the Guggenheim), the development of “museumlike” satel-
lites (including museum branches in corporate headquarters), the importance of trav-
eling exhibitions for most museums, and the standardization of administrative prac-
tices (in order to facilitate exchange procedures) all point to a globalization of the
cultural politics of museums. In addition, international corporate consulting firms
(functioning as “corporate cultural anthropologists”) are examining the sociocultural
environments of museums (e.g., employee interaction and cultural programing) in
order to adapt them to corporate culture.36 The convergence of corporate and muse-
um structures have prepared the groundwork for this transfer. Finally, we should also
remember that such interinstitutional relations are in most instances unequal and are
based on the transfer of cultural and economic capital.

The Museum Visitor

Both Huyssen and Silverstone underscore the significance of the museum as a mass
medium in terms of its potential for engaging the visitor through entertainment and
information.37 Unlike mass media such as television, however, museums operate si-
multaneously in the modes of the transitory and the material permanence of objects
(Huyssen 1995, 33; Silverstone 1994, 162). Huyssen describes this relationship with re-
spect to the museal gaze of the visitor:
The gaze at the museal object may provide a sense of its opaque and impenetrable ma-
teriality as well as an anamnestic space within which the transitoriness and differentiali-
ty of human cultures can be grasped. Via the activity of memory, set in motion and
nurtured by the contemporary museum in its broadest and most amorphous sense, the
museal gaze expands the ever shrinking space of the (real) present in a culture of amne-
sia, planned obsolescence and ever more synchronic and timeless information flows,
the hyperspace of the coming age of information highways. (1995, 34)

The potential of the museum as it relates to the visitor is based on a dialectic of re-
membering and forgetting. Silverstone describes this in terms of the artifact, of “the
familiar made strange; the strange made familiar” and the “‘curatorial’ work of the
visitor” which is embedded in memory (1994, 164, 165). For Huyssen, “the museum
serves both as burial chamber of the past . . . and as site of possible resurrections, how-
ever mediated and contaminated in the eye of the beholder” (1995, 15). Hans-Peter
Schwarz argues that even as museums integrate mass-media technologies as artifacts,
unlike most electronic mass media they retain a subversive potential to confront visi-
tors with the unexpected or alien (1996, 178–79).
If we choose to understand the potential of the museum as a mass medium, it is
also an increasingly differentiated one, with distinct audiences and “programs.” Thus,
Huyssen emphasizes the importance of theorizing museums and exhibition cultures
 The Sponsored Museum 211

that “can offer multiple narratives of meaning” (1995, 34). Certainly, the effectiveness
of museums and their exhibitions are linked to how they engage the visitors as active
participants in constructing the process of receiving the exhibition. In this regard,
Silverstone concludes that
the status of the object in the museum; the plausibility, persuasiveness and the offered
pleasures of the museum’s texts; the representation and articulation of space and time,
all are . . . dependent on the involvement and competence of the receivers of the com-
munication. The enormous amount of evaluative research in the museum is testi-
mony . . . to the acceptance of this view—however, much of that evaluative work is
premised on, at best, an inadequate view of the museum as a medium, and also on an
inadequate view of the role of the visitor in contributing to, rather than simply receiv-
ing, the communication on offer. (1994, 174)

Tony Bennett also theorizes the perception of the visitor in constructing the mean-
ing of the exhibition. Like Huyssen, Bennett develops the notion of the visitor’s gaze,
which he relates to the museum’s own “politics of the invisible”:
If it is true . . . that they so arrange the field of the visible as to allow an apprehension of
some further order of significance that cannot . . . be seen, the art museum is unique in
simultaneously organizing a division between those who can and those [who] cannot
see the invisible significances of the “art” to which it constantly beckons but never
makes manifest. Far less freely and publicly available, . . . the aesthetic theories of mod-
ernism and postmodernism selectively mediate the relations between the visitor and
the museum in providing . . . a means of reading the invisible grid of intertextual rela-
tions through which the works on display can be experienced as “art.” (1995, 172)

Despite the “museum boom” and the “democratization of the museum” in the late
1970s, in the early 1980s critics pointed to exclusionary practices, mediated through
exhibitions, that rendered women, minorities, and socially marginalized groups “in-
visible” (Bennett 1995, 172). The multiple “politics of the invisible” employed this
awareness in redefining the objects and ends of museum practice. However, in con-
structing a new space for the expression of marginalized cultures, Bennett observes
that these interventions need “to give careful consideration to the discursive forms
and pedagogic props and devices that might be used to mediate those invisibles in
such a way . . . as to be able, indeed, to give ‘the eye’ to those who cannot ‘see’” (172).
Thus, Bennett directs our attention to the complex questions of developing museum
pedagogies that address viewers on multiple levels and that engage them in the process
of constructing their own relations to the exhibits. Perhaps an even more critical ques-
tion involves the extent to which audiences and communities can be involved in the
process of cultural production rather than solely in terms of reception.38
As we have seen, much of the institutional practice of museums offers the potential
to engage the visitor by integrating multiple narratives, some of them dissonant, into
exhibition practice. The potential for changing the museum from outside is, as Huyssen
212 The Sponsored Museum

and Silverstone indicate, related to its success as a mass medium of cultural communi-
cation, information, and entertainment. Museums can only survive if they engage
their audiences; museum visitors must, alternatively, assert their own collective inter-
ests. Rather than competing in the myriad and rapidly relativized offerings of the
marketplace for experiences (Erlebnismarkt), cultural institutions that define them-
selves in terms of an alterity—which rejects the primacy of a market-oriented cultural
politics and simultaneously engages visitors in creating spaces for redefined curatorial
practices—may be more successful within the realm of a “postutopian cultural poli-
tics” (Schulze 1992). Similarly, museum pedagogies that inform and foster a critical
dialogue and become a part of the museum’s own institutional redefinition can con-
tribute to creating such alternative spaces by “breaking down the walls,” both from in-
side and from outside.
 7. Cybersponsoring

Cultural sponsorships assume a pivotal role in linking notions of corporate innova-

tion with artistic creativity. At the same time, they provide legitimacy for new product
technologies within cultural institutions and at events. As a function of corporate cul-
tural politics, we have seen that technology is embedded in sponsorships relating to
(1) product promotion and consumption (e.g., BMW’s “Art Cars”), (2) the organiza-
tion and representation of social milieus and identities (e.g., product technologies at
Ravestock), (3) the aesthetic mediation of events (e.g., visualization technologies used
by the Bregenz Festival), (4) the representation of product histories as a filter for re-
membering and interpreting the past (e.g., BMW’s Isetta exhibition), and (5) images
of mobility, tourism, and space.
Although the dissemination of products or technologies constitutes a central objec-
tive of many sponsorships, it is not surprising that much of the growth in sponsoring
has been in service-related industries (banking, insurance, and communications), for
culture offers the potential for mediating immaterial goods. Thus, image transfer re-
mains a primary objective for product sponsorships as well as for those that address the
representation of corporate images and services within social contexts. Although prod-
uct and image may be signified distinctly in various contexts, it is their fusion—both
in promotion and in constructing spaces of contemporary culture and identity—that
has become characteristic of postmodern culture (Wernick 1991, 181–82).
This fusion is epitomized by digital media. Facilitated by sophisticated hardware
products, electronic technologies are creating new multidimensional, virtual spaces
and communities, reconfiguring communication and how we conceptualize everyday
life.1 The expansion of these spaces also facilitates the further globalization of corpo-
rate cultural politics and transnational corporations in a cyberspace, which knows no
geographical boundaries. Indeed, there seem to be few areas of social interaction
untouched by electronic technologies or their effects. Obviously, cyberspace offers
considerable potential for new forms of corporate colonization. However, I have also
argued that the shifting contours of social interaction present opportunities for inter-
ventions that are not defined by corporate interests as well as apertures to interrogate
and externalize such interests. In this regard, cyberspace is certainly no exception. It is

213
214 Cybersponsoring

a highly contested terrain, both as a space for the expansion of corporate capital and
interests and as one that threatens the very manner in which corporations conduct
business and the security of their operations.
The following exploration of the relations among culture, technology, and corpo-
rate cultural politics can only tentatively indicate several emerging issues related to the
globalization of corporate cultural politics and electronic communication. This discus-
sion begins with the museum, continuing our investigation of its transformation and
redefinition as a highly visible site of cultural representation. The emergence of the
digital museum introduces a new dimension to the discussion of the museum as a mass
medium (Huyssen 1995, Silverstone 1994) by making it a truly electronic medium with
the potential to reach global audiences. New museum hybrids use electronic technolo-
gies in order to challenge existing models from “outside.” Simultaneously, established
museums are integrating digital technologies from within. Both processes reflect a fun-
damental reconfiguration of museums with respect to (1) how their contents are medi-
ated to publics (e.g., through electronic storage and dissemination), (2) a heightened
awareness of technology as a medium of artistic expression (i.e., the legitimacy of
media art and online art), (3) the integration of information-management technolo-
gies into administrative and curatorial programs, and (4) new curatorial practices and
modes of representation.2 In particular, the electronic production and dissemination
of museum contents (e.g., over the World Wide Web) has the potential to position it
within the media marketplace as a cultural programmer. The way museums and spon-
sors create spaces (both “real” and “virtual”) for artistic production, performance, and
audience interactivity is crucial. This process relates to broader issues of community,
access, public policy, and corporate cultural politics. Finally, I would like to consider
the potential for engaging critical discourse on corporate cultural politics.

Meta-Museums: “Electronic Bauhaus” or R and D Parks for Cultural Software?

The emergence of new museum hybrids, “centers” conceptually based on art and
technology, illustrates the significance of technology transfer from corporations to
museums. These centers also reflect the museum’s expanded function as a space for
cultural and technological experimentation and development, which can be trans-
ferred to and adapted by corporations. Three centers have gained international atten-
tion as models for combining art and technology under one conceptual and adminis-
trative structure: the Ars Electronica Center (AEC) in Linz, Austria; the Zentrum für
Kunst und Medientechnologie (ZKM) (Center for Art and Media Technology) in
Karlsruhe, Germany; and the InterCommunication Center in Tokyo, Japan. To vary-
ing degrees, all three centers emerged from the interests of local cultural politics, eco-
nomic development, higher education, and corporations. The AEC provides the most
visible example of technology transfer from corporations to museums, but it also di-
rects our attention to other models that function primarily as more commercial cen-
ters for research and development (e.g., the Institut für Neue Medien in Frankfurt am
Main).3
 Cybersponsoring 215

The AEC is perhaps the best-known of the existing centers as a result of the Ars
Electronica Festival for art and technology founded in 1979. The festival provided a
forum for media artists and gained further international recognition among artists
and museum curators through its annual Prix Ars Electronica (1987), sponsored by
Austria’s public television (ORF). Based on an initiative of the ORF program direc-
tor for Upper Austria, Hannes Leopoldseder, the city of Linz agreed to fund and sup-
port the AEC as its wholly owned subsidiary.4 Regional economic development and
cultural politics were a key component of the AEC project from its conception and
opening in 1996. Mayor Franz Dobusch underscored its function as a vehicle for
technological and economic development:
The Ars Electronica Center positively influences the innovative atmosphere in the eco-
nomic region of Linz and promotes the interdisciplinary cooperation between indus-
try, research, and art. It leads the way for the necessary process of catching up with
technological development in our region and forms the basis for new social struc-
tures. The Ars Electronica Center is . . . a mediator for all questions regarding techno-
logical innovation and serves as a resource for interested parties from all sectors of the
population.5

The AEC hybridizes the concept of the R and D park and combines it with the
expanded institutional base of a museum, including studio and performance spaces
for media artists and interactive installations—a central concept of the new media
and art centers, as it is for science and technology museums (Mintz 1998, 23–24; Grad-
wohl and Feldman 1998, 185). Permanent exhibits at the AEC include a large three-
dimensional virtual-reality installation, CAVE (Cave Automatic Virtual Environment),
developed at the University of Chicago for exploring and transforming molecular
structures; a Cyber City virtual-reality project with tools for city planning and archi-
tecture, in which visitors test various planning scenarios and their potential social or
ecological consequences; the Knowledge Net electronic classroom, with facilities for
distance learning and video conferencing; and an experiential SKY–Media Loft café
(so-called Erlebnis-Café ). Finally, the AEC’s Museum of the Future reflects the con-
ceptualization of space as a themed environment by combining entertainment, inter-
activity, consumption, and education, a process that has its historical roots in Disney’s
many attractions.6
In addition to its role in education (as a destination for school groups and a site for
technology seminars), the AEC validates its role as a key participant in cultural poli-
tics by promoting itself as an “economic partner” and offering services to corporations
in the region.7 Although the AEC provides spaces for the development of “cultural
software” that can be adapted by corporations in order to promote and package their
products (e.g., the German direct-mail firm Quelle envisions a cooperative venture
for presenting its products on the Internet), corporate transfer of hardware and capital
into the center is, at present, the most tangible feature of this exchange. Technology
transfer occurs within four primary modes: (1) promotional showcasing of corporate
216 Cybersponsoring

products, services, and technologies; (2) sponsorships for special exhibitions and pro-
grams (including funding, advertising, events, and materials); (3) hardware and soft-
ware for museum administration, infrastructure, and information dissemination (e.g.,
servers and Web sites); and (4) hardware and software for permanent exhibitions and
corporate products used by media artists.8 These processes not only indicate the func-
tion of meta-museums as experimental spaces for evaluating uses for new technolo-
gies, they also relate to technology’s broader uses in shaping the contexts of social rela-
tions, such as forms of electronic consumption. It is, therefore, hardly a coincidence
that the AEC’s sponsors—Oracle, Digital, Microsoft, Siemens Nixdorf, and Silicon
Graphics, among others—have recognized the potential of the arts and technology
centers and “traditional” museums as sites for developing and assessing the cultural
component of technological applications.
The meta-museum as a contested site for developing new forms of media use and
interaction or as an experimental forum that could function to interrogate the rela-
tions of media is reflected in sponsors’ responses to the theme of the Ars Electronica
Festival ’98: “INFOWAR: information.macht.krieg.” The festival, including a net
symposium, interactive media, installations, CAVE, events, and performances, ad-
dressed the expansion of multimedia information networks in cyberspace as forms of
war, struggle, and power derived from information, encompassing “connecting issues
ranging from hacker ethics to speculators’ informationally generated acceleration of
Asian financial markets” (Stocker and Schöpf 1998, 16).9 Although the theoretical dis-
courses around INFOWAR implicitly established the links between the emerging uses
of networked communication as an instrument of power and repression, this narra-
tive was largely rejected by the AEC’s sponsors, who not only denied their own par-
ticipation in shaping and directing electronic communication as a form of power
(economic, political, or social), but also reduced the notion of INFOWAR to issues of
corporate strategy, the social Darwinism of the free marketplace, or a war against
those who would threaten corporate interests (i.e., hackers) and therefore the public
good. This was, in part, exemplified by statements prefacing the INFOWAR catalog,
such as those by Microsoft Austria’s managing director Alexander Stüger:
My hope is that the “Infowar” theme leads to a constructive debate on the subject of
information without resorting to populist scaremongering about new information pos-
sibilities. From an economic perspective, of course, employing information in the right
way means competitive advantages for firms or national economies. I certainly would
not categorize that as “war,” but rather as “competition” (quoted in Stocker and Schöpf
1998, 12).

This, of course, obfuscates the interests of corporate politics, not to mention their im-
plication in structuring electronic environments and social relations, one of the major
themes of INFOWAR (Stocker and Schöpf 1998, 280). In this regard, Arthur and
Marilouise Kroker discuss the “rhetoric machine” developed by Microsoft founder
Bill Gates in his book Business @ the Speed of Thought: Using a Digital Nervous System.
Gates establishes a digital ideology for a digitized future, an ideology that conflates
 Cybersponsoring 217

public and corporate interests in the form of “friction-free capitalism” (directly link-
ing producers and consumers) and colonizes social spaces (health care, public policy,
warfare, and education).10
In the corporations’ statements on INFOWAR, we can also observe attempts to

Figure 7.1. Sponsors and partners for INFOWAR at the Ars Electronica Center.
218 Cybersponsoring

establish and legitimize their own competing discourses related to and representations of
technology, in part by disassociating their own institutional uses of information as eco-
nomic, political, and ultimately military power from the realm of everyday social rela-
tions. Indeed, they have already understood and operationalized the rules of INFOWAR
by establishing their own presence within the sites of communities, such as media arts
projects (e.g., at the AEC itself ) that interrogate the social uses of electronic art and
technology. What better way to influence and participate in the structuring of media-
art centers than to fund their development as a “partnership” that will lead to their
(re-)configuration somewhere between R and D parks and themed environments?
Like the AEC, the Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie was also initially
funded by local governments (the City of Karlsruhe and later Baden-Württemberg) as
part of a regional marketing and tourism plan; however, it has established a much
more expansive museum project than the AEC and has deemphasized potential links
to corporate R and D. The ZKM encompasses the Institute for Image Media, the In-
stitute for Music and Acoustics, the Media Theater, the Media Museum, the Museum
of Contemporary Art, and the Mediathek. The constituent museums and institutes
within the center are designed to foster interaction among artistic production, experi-
mentation, exhibition, collection, and documentation activities. Former director
Heinrich Klotz invokes the tradition of Bauhaus as a project linked to modernity and
the “creative connectivity between two contemporary social facts, art and technology”
(quoted in Miles and Zavala 1994, 14). Klotz situates the contemporary relations of art
and technology within a “second modernity” (following deconstruction and post-
modernity), one that does not follow a linear, historical tradition of the historical
avant-garde but allows a “pluralism of styles,” approaches, and strategies, creating
a new vocabulary for modernity (Klotz, Bredekamp, and Frohne 1997, 10–12). For
Klotz, Frank Gehry’s design for the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao is characteristic of
the creative potential of this second modernity.11 Moreover, he emphasizes the institu-
tional role of the ZKM in opening spaces for art and social transformation within the
social context of Germany:
A place must be established in Germany in which the attempt is made to advance artis-
tic and media technological issues and to anticipate for the future, a place in which the
goal is a synthesis of the best creative forces in the arts and media technologies. ZKM
aims at making multi-media “Gesamtkunstwerks” possible, as well as exploring special
technologies, promoting the new, and equally well, providing critique of a blinded
media euphoria. (Klotz 1995, 9)

A key function of this “Electronic Bauhaus” is to provide institutional legitimation

for multimedia art (i.e., video, virtual-reality, or computer-based projects) within the
museum. The ZKM does not function as a warehouse or depot (Grasskamp 1992, 94)
for exhibiting media art. Rather, as Hans-Peter Schwarz underscores, its role is to
represent the “effects and social functions of the media” in the museum (1997, 28).
Schwarz calls for exhibition practices that invert the relations between the media ob-
 Cybersponsoring 219

jects on display and the audience in favor of interactive rather than passive reception
(1997, 13). Yet he also warns that the danger of the interconnectedness of the media
within a multimedia “Gesamtkunstwerk” (i.e., one combining multiple media and
multiple modes of aesthetic representation), as well as the tendency of such works to
contribute to an erasure of the boundaries between “aesthetic creation and reality,”
must be tempered by the museum’s own “deconstruction of the myth of media tech-
nology” (1996, 180).
Some the most effective works of media art may be those that intersect with the
contexts of everyday life and media use. Although media art by no means represents
an integral or extensive part of most museum collections, it has already developed
its own canon of classics (e.g., works by Paul Garrin, Marie-Jo Lafontaine, Bruce
Nauman, Nam June Paik, Bill Viola, Wolf Vostell) through international shows, such
as the documenta in Kassel, Germany; Ars Electronica in Linz, Austria; or the Venice
Biennale (Galloway 1998, 46–47). The incremental legitimation of media art within
the international art market has, of course, led to its historicization and commodifica-
tion but has also created new institutional and imaginative spaces to investigate its
own position within those processes.
One striking example of this intersection of media, art, and everyday life is the
rapid rise of game culture (Grossberg 1994, 54) during the 1980s and 1990s, both as a
cultural practice and as a mode of aesthetic mediation. In his installation Welt der
Spiele (1994) at the ZKM, Friedemann Schindler appropriates the video game DOOM
as the basis for involving “players” in a critical awareness of their interaction with
game contents, thematizing violence and military imagery. Schindler destablizes the
relations between game player and game by altering the environment within which
the game is played. Players are seated in a dentist’s chair similar to one used as an in-
strument of torture in the movie Marathon Man. While they play the game using a
data helmet in order to follow the audio and visual game, their physical reactions are
transmitted to video monitors placed at the base of the chair and are then observed by
other visitors. Removed from the personalized space of everyday game-playing activi-
ty, the players become aware of their role as performers (game players) and objects of
this performance. Schindler argues that “the structured interactivity—one of the
characteristics of commercial video games—is broken here. The dual role of observer
and participant, although analytically differentiated, is restored and the character
of the interaction as an event is made conscious” (quoted in Schwarz 1997, 52).12
Schindler’s installation gained heightened significance after the school shootings at
Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, where it was alleged that the violence
in the video game DOOM contributed to the student assailants’ behavior. Schindler
has based his installation on pedagogical research, which he participated in, on the ef-
fects of video games like DOOM within youth culture. In this sense, Schindler’s proj-
ect, combined with his other projects that ask young game players to discuss their re-
actions to game playing and game culture, contributes to a critical pedagogy of media
both within and outside the museum.
220 Cybersponsoring

Figure 7.2. Experiencing art and technology: Lufthansa sponsors the Hamburg Media Arts Festival (Mediale). Text at top
reads, “With fantasy and technology, on the way to new worlds of experience.”

Although this deconstruction of the relations of technology and culture is un-

doubtedly well represented in many of the individual works of media art exhibited at
the ZKM, including Schindler’s DOOM installation,13 the integration of a critical
analysis of media technologies into ZKM programming as a whole remains tenta-
 Cybersponsoring 221

tive.14 Indeed, the way the centers for art and technology have developed institutional
structures and discourses for representing their own roles in media technologies in-
volves what Schwarz refers to as a paradoxical “mediatization of the media,” that is,
the transfer, representation, and mediation of mass media itself as the object of exhibi-
tions for mass audiences (1997, 29).
This self-referential quality of the centers reflects their functions as meta-museums
in at least two key respects.15 The first involves their attempt to represent and mediate
the discourses of their constituent museums, institutes, or programs for internal and
external dissemination through networked communication and experimental projects
among institutes, museums, and studios16 —designed to create new modes of artistic
production and interaction as well as communities in real or virtual space (e.g., media
laboratories or Internet projects). A second significant feature defining meta-museums
is their own adaptation of the technical and communicative characteristics of the tech-
nologies they exhibit and mediate. Like the electronic media they represent and em-
ploy, meta-museums conceptualize their activities as multidimensional, nonlinear, in-
teractive, and networked. For example, Ursula Frohne refers to Friedrich Kittler’s
notion of the computer as a metaphor for reconceptualizing the museum:
The museum itself can be considered both as a hybrid, as well as “universal storage
medium” of temporal models and structures, which is comparable to the electronic stor-
age units of a computer, ordering art works according to a museal plan, and opening up
contemporary space for interpretation, by transforming its respective exhibition con-
texts into a new historical level. The relativization of the works as a result of time has the
effect of counteracting the aestheticization of their temporality. (Frohne 1997, 49)

Yet I would argue that the works do not gain their immediacy primarily as a result
of their re-presentation in infinite constellations and combinations, which would
somehow inherently destabilize their privileged status as museal objects, but, rather,
through the critical moment of interrogation and intervention by artists, curators,
and audiences. The notion of “the computer as museum” leads to the meta-museum
as a metaphorical structure that also assumes the logics associated with the new elec-
tronic media it represents. Such structures tend to position museum visitors as “com-
ponents” of the technological hardware itself or as “users” within the network.17
Rather than reimaging themselves in terms of the logics of the media they employ
and represent, I suggest that meta-museums integrate a more dialectical approach,
which involves the deconstruction (Schwarz 1996, 180) and destabilization of the tech-
nologies they mediate. The art and technology centers must interrogate their multiple
functions as institutions of technological legitimation, transfer, and critical inquiry.
Whereas media art must first gain access into the museum in order to engage audiences
in an exploration of technology’s diverse narratives and social functions, curatorial
strategies must provide contexts that problematize the relations between art and tech-
nology rather than allowing them to become extensions of entertainment based on the
commercial uses of media.18 By recognizing their role both in legitimizing and in
222 Cybersponsoring

deconstructing media art, meta-museums can create a dynamic tension that can be
used to explore their relations.

Virtual Museums
In some respects, meta-museums such as the AEC and ZKM now situate their role in
the media-art terrain as a bridge between virtual and real space by displaying online art
exhibitions (such as Net_Condition) within the museum. Although media art has gained
increasing legitimacy within museum collections, it is the digitization and mediation
of existing collections that holds even wider implications for fundamentally altering
the role of all museums and the way their collections and exhibitions are received.
During the 1990s, collection digitization (in CD-ROMs and online) was proceeding at
an exponential rate, albeit at varying levels of technological sophistication.19 Maxwell
Anderson, director of the Whitney Museum of American Art, became one of the most
visible advocates of digitizing the museum and integrating media art. Although
Anderson recognizes that viewing exhibitions and collections online will not supplant
the experience of viewing the original, he foresees an enormous potential for dissemi-
nating culture (e.g., on the Web) and expanding the mission of the museum in doing
so. Part of this process involves altering the way museums contextualize and mediate
artifacts. Anderson argues that virtual representation will re-create the origins and
functions of artifacts, which have been removed from their original contexts, thereby
expanding the viewer’s understanding of the relationships between artifact and con-
text. He envisions museums constructing virtual galleries with
panel paintings reinserted into chapels, gargoyles reattached to cathedral walls, Roman
portraits repositioned on bodies in simulated public buildings. The educational value
of such three-dimensional imaging will be to breathe new life into works deprived of
their original context, and will make the pilgrimage to our galleries all the more re-
warding. (1997, 29)

Missing in this scenario, however, are the histories of how museum artifacts came to be
in the museum in the first place and how they can now be magically returned to their
original sites through a sort of virtual reinscription. How indeed will virtual exhibi-
tions (re-)create the political and economic contexts of colonialism that facilitated
and legitimized the acquisitions of many museum collections without creating new
forms of mystification?20
There are also considerable economic incentives to disseminating culture online.
Anderson theorizes that if 965,000 visitors paid to go to the Art Institute of Chicago’s
Monet exhibition, many more would be willing to pay user fees to (re-)visit the exhi-
bition online. These fees could not only be used to defray exhibition costs, but they
would also generate funds for other thematically linked exhibitions online (1997, 28).
What Anderson envisions for exhibitions on the World Wide Web is much like pay-
per-view television. With the convergence of television and Web technologies (e.g.,
WebTV), such exhibitions would be included as another form of programming
 Cybersponsoring 223

(Anderson 1997, 31). Similar types of programs (museum exhibitions, theater perfor-
mances) could be packaged and promoted by museums and sponsors. Thus, Ander-
son argues, museums will be able to compete within the mass media marketplace,
where “museum directors . . . have another expertise demanded of them: television
producer”:
Through astute video programming on networked Web sites, museums need no longer
accede to being marginalized because of the relentless onslaught of powerful commer-
cial interests that have directed the audiovisual stimulation of the mass audience. With
networked digital technology available through the cable box or through the air, it will
be a battle of wits to get our multiple messages across, as well as to cajole audiences to
communicate with each other through our museums by means of wireless keyboards
and, soon enough, voice recognition systems. Which will require . . . a new kind of
museum.(1997, 32)

In order to compete within the media marketplace of cable and WebTV, museum
directors and curators will have to package their contents in appealing and salable for-
mats. The relatively short history of marketing collections and exhibitions on CD-
ROM indicates that the mass market is indeed limited to a relative few large-scale proj-
ects.21 Museum programming will have to establish its own “difference” and profile to
distinguish it from the proliferation of cultural offerings. Moreover, the visions of
wired or virtual museums do not sufficiently address content. To the extent that di-
verse discourses are presented, will they be reduced to niche marketing? Many of the
more creative projects in both traditional and new media will not be sufficiently com-
mercial for mass marketing. And it is precisely these types of projects that, working
against market rationales, may be economically feasible on the World Wide Web, al-
though they will probably not generate significant amounts of income from user fees
once most museums are offering an array of online exhibitions and artworks—not to
mention those presented by individual artist-entrepreneurs, galleries, educational and
arts institutions, or corporations. In fact, museums will be competing with other arts
institutions online. Corporate museums or collaborative joint ventures between cor-
porations and museums (e.g., between the Whitney and Intel or between the Brooklyn
Academy of Music [BAM], the Guggenheim, and Lucent Technologies)22 will create
new spaces for corporate representation of culture and will be a dominant force within
the media and online markets, which already reflect a high degree of concentration.
The museum as a mass medium, as a space for engaging wider audiences in a
dialogue on diverse cultures and as a site of collective remembering and forgetting
(Huyssen 1995, 19, 34), now assumes a new meaning and function as an electronic
mass medium, globally linked through the Internet and disseminated in multiple for-
mats. Once limited to the reproduction of its contents in catalogs, museums may em-
ploy digitization to expand their possibilities by introducing audio, visual, and inter-
active reproduction. From a media perspective, digitization does for the museum
what audio and video reproduction has done for concerts and theater performances.
224 Cybersponsoring

It also provides new products for reproducing the exhibition as a “performance event”
within new contexts and markets (e.g., schools, homes, offices). The range of contexts
and modes of reception is expanded exponentially, meanwhile widening the field of
sensory interaction and reaching into everyday life. As the museum becomes a site for
cultural production (e.g., artists’ studios, interactive-exhibition projects) and perfor-
mance, it can also reconfigure and reproduce those projects in multiple formats. Like
the relationship between performance and reproduction, the desire to experience
“live” is not eliminated. Live and recorded performances mutually reinforce one an-
other. Yet the museum’s evolution into a mass medium and the reproduction of its
contents also integrate it into new networks of commodification that simultaneously
relativize its collections and exhibitions. Although the museum has certainly been
subject to the forces of the cultural marketplace, the extent to which it will be able to
engage media technologies in order to create new spaces for the interrogation of so-
ciety and culture, as well as the specific quality of this process, remains unclear.
Just as we differentiate between various types of museums and museum visitors in
real space, we must also be conscious of the different functions and objectives of the
emerging virtual museums (as sites of provocation, entertainment, consumption, edu-
cation) and of the types of museum visitors in cyberspace. Virtual museums and on-
line art might attract types of visitors different from those who are revisiting exhibi-
tions in real museums. There is still much to be learned regarding who actually visits
or interacts with online art and how they do so (Chadwick and Boverie 1999, 8).
Sabine Fabo argues that virtual museums may lead to a reconsideration of notions of
museal authenticity, in particular the imaginary and representational boundaries be-
tween what is considered material or real and works of virtual art, which also engage a
sense of the imaginary (1999, 424). Certainly, the evolution of new museum hybrids
that integrate both virtual and nonvirtual forms of exhibition and dissemination may
be useful in developing new curatorial and representational strategies. However, I also
argue that visitors will actually differentiate between the various contexts of reception.
That is to say, they will visit the physical spaces of real museums (or hybrid meta-
museums) for a kind of experience different from what they expect in their visits to
virtual museums or environments through electronic networks. At present, the most
interesting projects are those that do not simply replicate exhibitions in real space or
function as forms of marketing and merchandising for collections but, rather, explore
forms of mediation that are not possible in nonvirtual spaces (e.g., Walker Art
Center’s Beyond Interface exhibition).
Moreover, we must explore the manner in which a project’s aesthetics, design, and
accessibility within cyberspace structures visitors’ interaction with the project, or po-
tentially alters the work itself. Unlike artifacts stored and disseminated over the Inter-
net, many online art projects utilizing hypermedia challenge the notion of “user-
friendly” interaction through multiple interfaces, texts, and sites that defy rapid
orientation and navigation. On the one hand, visitors are challenged through a sense
of disorientation and the unexpected; on the other, they can also choose paths of in-
quiry and interaction within a range of options. This dynamic tension, which engages
 Cybersponsoring 225

visitors in a creative spectrum of challenges (zones of disorientation and rupture) as

well as creative production and imagination (zones of interaction, response, or pro-
duction), is what may characterize some of the more successful projects. These charac-
teristics seem to make online art an effective medium for challenging established
norms.
Although online art is by no means isolated from processes of appropriation and
commodification, it does share some characteristics of conceptual art or site-specific
installations, which are also characterized by their temporality in the spaces they oc-
cupy. In this sense, virtual, online art is even more difficult to “collect.” Many media
curators and directors, such as the AEC’s Gerfried Stocker, clearly distinguish between
“documentation” and “collection”:
We are only building documentations, not collections, because you can’t collect the
moment of happening. The most important thing in net art is the time-based process
of exchange and communication. And you can’t collect that, you can only document it.
But I believe . . . that I would rather invest in production than collection. What is the
role of the museum in net art? You can’t support it by collecting it. As soon as you col-
lect it, you damage it.23

Certainly, there is a fundamental difference between net or online art projects and
museum collections that are digitized for electronic dissemination. The interactive di-
mension of online art does create an event character similar to that of performances
and installations, and each visit to the site may be slightly different from the last.
Nonetheless, successful online projects will probably be “collected” and stored online
for future dissemination, as well as used for promotion or merchandising (to the extent
that future technologies will be able to disseminate works produced with software that
has become obsolete or to convert them into new formats). In any case, artistic pro-
duction has moved to center stage in the conceptual development of meta-museums
and media centers. By establishing the museum as a site of artistic production and col-
laboration (beyond the functions of acquisition, collection, documentation, and exhi-
bition), both meta-museums and virtual museums are providing further impetus for
reconfiguring the status of artists, curators, museum directors, and publics.

Artists, Engineers, and Audiences

Centers for art and technology, the emergence of virtual museums, and museum-
corporate collaborations reflect a heightened awareness of the historical relations be-
tween cultural production and technology within institutional discourses. Certainly,
the development of contemporary video and media art has involved varying degrees
of collaboration among artists, engineers, and researchers, but in many cases the ob-
jective of the collaboration has been to deconstruct the cultural functions of technolo-
gy itself.
Artists have appropriated technological hardware and software in order to interro-
gate and destabilize its representations and functions. Beginning in the 1960s, the Ex-
periments in Art in Technology (EAT) program was an outgrowth of artist-engineer
226 Cybersponsoring

collaborations that led to larger interdisciplinary projects exploring the social and cul-
tural uses of new communications technologies (Klüver 1994, 218; Penny 1995, 65). A
paradigmatic example of these early collaborations is the work of Billy Klüver, who
gained permission from his employer, Bell Labs, to work with artists, beginning with
Jean Tinguely and following with Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, Andy Warhol,
and later, video artist Nam June Paik (Klüver 1994, 207–19). Tinguely’s Homage to
New York (1960), a machine that would destroy itself in front of a theater audience,
was completed with the technical support provided by Klüver and his colleague
Harold Hughes (Klüver 1994, 207–8). Homage to New York not only literally decon-
structed the representation of urban technology, it did so as a performance installa-
tion, which challenged the permanence of museal art by foregrounding temporality
through the process of self-destruction. As Klüver observes, an important outcome of
the EAT (with more than six thousand members) during the 1960s and 1970s was its
program to create a “training ground for larger-scale involvement in social issues for
both the artist and the engineer” (1994, 218). Toward this end, many of the projects at-
tempted to engage audiences (in different countries) in a critical awareness of their
own uses of electronic communications technologies (216–17).
Hans-Peter Schwarz traces the history of media development through the incre-
mental and cumulative interaction of artists (e.g., Robert Rauschenberg, with his early
interactive art), engineers, and researchers. Schwarz argues that the conceptual devel-
opment of many virtual-reality technologies had been prepared by the work of media
artists, such as work by Dan Sandin, Tom DeFanti, and Gay Sayers under an NEA
grant, followed by Tom Zimmerman’s “data glove” as a conceptual model for NASA’s
production of a working prototype (Schwarz 1997, 63). Within music, the adaptation
of electronic technologies for instruments and audio reproduction was even more in-
tegral, as musicians developed their own technical expertise (66). Whereas Schwarz
cites the work of Myron Krueger (Video Place), filmmaker Morton Heilig (Sensorama),
and Ivan Sutherland (Scetchpad) in order to document the extent to which virtual re-
ality was a product of technical and artistic experimentation, Howard Rheingold’s his-
tory of virtual reality (1991) presents a complicated and intricate narrative involving
the pioneers of virtual reality (Krueger, Heilig, Sutherland) as well as U.S. Defense
Department funding, NASA, R and D projects at Bell Labs, government-funded
projects at universities (e.g., the Massachusetts Institute of Technology), and the com-
mercial development of audiovisual technologies.
Simon Penny, who has been extensively involved in interactive media both as an
artist and as a curator, emphasizes the importance of commercial and institutional
forces at work in shaping the contexts in which media art is produced and disseminated:
In the art world, discourses on the nature of the digital, cyberspace, virtual space, etc.
have a peculiarly amnesiac quality about them. It is forgotten that the primary purpose
of digital communications networks are, and always have been, strategic, military and
commercial. . . . we forget that VR [virtual reality] and interactive interface research,
 Cybersponsoring 227

indeed basic computer research in general, have been almost exclusively military in ori-
gin. It is at least possible that this lineage has shaped the technology, confining its range
of possibilities as an artistic medium. (1996, 127)

With the increasing convergence and hybridization of arts, education, and corpo-
rations, the interests of artists and researchers have become more complex. Much of
the basic research in technology was driven and structured through government or de-
fense industry funding in public and private research institutions.24 Many of the new,
smaller R and D centers, like the Institut für Neue Medien in Frankfurt am Main,
combine commercial contract work with technology research and art projects and be-
came corporate entities primarily as a result of privatization during the 1980s and
1990s. Undoubtedly, the artist-engineer dichotomy becomes more questionable as
younger artists have technological training or become more technologically literate.
This heightened awareness of new technologies can be strategically employed in a
more extensive exploration of media within art and culture. Nonetheless, media
artists must largely work within the institutional structures and communications net-
works that are, for the most part, developed and organized by commercial interests:
In terms of corporate economics, VR serves the computer industry very well: it is intui-
tive (no learning curve, no consumer resistance), and it calls for unlimited computer
power, thus fulfilling the industry’s need for technological desire. The transference of
libidinal desire onto fetish objects offers the promise of ecstasy but never finally con-
summates it, driving the consumer to the next purchase in an unending coitus inter-
ruptus. (Penny 1994, 247)

Penny’s own work with virtual reality, and his analysis of its potential, suggests a more
limited, strategic use in social critique, a use that becomes increasingly difficult as
electronic technologies are embedded as a given within patterns of everyday life (1994,
247–48). Thus, a critical media consciousness must also integrate context-specific as
well as broader theoretical and institutional analyses of existing and emerging tech-
nologies rather than foregrounding new electronic media solely in terms of their
utopian or dystopian functions. Analyses of media art increasingly explore their con-
texts of production and reception (or the fusion of these contexts), as well as prob-
lematizing their positions within virtual spaces (Blackman 1998, 137).

Brandon
Virtual museums are using online, networked communication as a platform to inves-
tigate the mediation of social relations through technology. One of the most com-
pelling online art projects, in terms of its exploration of the construction of identity
within virtual space, is Brandon: A One-Year Narrative Project in Installments devel-
oped by filmmaker and artist Shu Lea Cheang for the Guggenheim Virtual Museum:
BRANDON derives its title from Brandon/Teena Brandon of Nebraska, USA, a gender-
crossing individual who was raped and murdered in 1993 after his female anatomy was
228 Cybersponsoring

revealed. Cheang’s project deploys Brandon into cyberspace through multi-layered nar-
ratives and images whose trajectory leads to issues of crime and punishment in the
cross-section between real and virtual space. Conceived as a multi-artist/multi-author/
multi-institutional collaboration, BRANDON will unfold over the course of the com-
ing year [1998], with 4 interface[s] developed . . . for artists’ participation and public
intervention.25

Multiple-user spaces (chat rooms), a virtual MOO (multi-user object-oriented

programming) court at Harvard (including experts on cyberlaw), and online sym-
posia provided mediations of Brandon Teena that extended beyond the Guggenheim’s
BRANDON project itself. Linked installations in the Theatrum Anatomicum inter-
face, developed by the Society for Old and New Media, Amsterdam (based on draw-
ings of the original “theater” from 1773), problematize the relations of body, gender,
crime, and medicine. The reconstruction of the amphitheater-like spectacles and its
spectators reimages: “The operating table at the center where the body dissecting les-
sons were performed on executed criminals for medical society and selected viewers in
the 17th century, is reconfigured into a net public interface.”26

Figure 7.3. Above, BRANDON in virtual space: the Guggenheim’s BRANDON Project. Facing page, engaging BRANDON
in virtual space: the Web page from which one enters the bigdoll interface. BRANDON has been made possible by grants
from The Bohen Foundation, The New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, a Moving Image Installation and Inter-
active Media Fellowship from The Rockefeller Foundation, a Computer Arts Fellowship from the New York Foundation
for the Arts, and, in Holland, grants from The Mondriaan Foundation and the Ministry for Cultural Affairs. Copyright The
Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, New York.
 Cybersponsoring 229

What I find particularly striking about the interfaces in BRANDON is the dy-
namic, creative spectrum of challenges (zones of disorientation and rupture) as well as
of creative production and imagination (zones of interaction, response, or produc-
tion). As visitors navigate the interfaces (bigdoll interface, roadtrip interface, mooplay
interface, and panopticon interface), they explore multiple subject positions. These
may include the virtual road trip in which the visitor, in part, assumes the role of
Brandon, making stops along the way.27 Other visitors to the road-trip interface may
discover an autobiographical text written by a fictional driver who picks up Brandon
hitchhiking. The driver-narrator relates this experience with Brandon, describing the
ambivalence of his or her own identity and Brandon’s attraction. When the narrator
learns of Brandon’s brutal murder, Brandon’s rage becomes the narrator’s own, shift-
ing and alternating subject positions, in a trajectory approaching Brandon:
i wasn’t trying to start a revolution, i didn’t ask to be sacrificed, his voice rising now. is
this all my life was worth, to be used as a character in a tragedy of someone else’s mak-
ing? if this is my punishment, what was my crime? if I’m such a hero, where’s my re-
ward? and his gaze is burning me branding me forever.28
230 Cybersponsoring

The dynamics of the driver-hitchhiker reminds us of our visit in the Theatrum

Anatomicum, where the visitor as cyberspace driver-navigator assumes the spectatorial
gaze of the voyeur. The observer-voyeur enters the “operating theater” of anatomy,
where the instrumentalization of the body, as a function of medicine and science,
converge in the spectacle of the amphitheater.29 Although visitors may choose to enter
or exit the interfaces or to navigate particular visual narratives, they are never com-
pletely in control, finding themselves drawn into an increasingly complex network of
interrelationships in which the representation of Brandon as both a historical and fic-
tional, “real and virtual,” subject at once emerges and simultaneously becomes more
fragmentary. In terms of its macronarratives, the navigation of the interfaces and links
evokes the reinscription of Brandon in virtual and real (historical, fictional, juridical-
administrative) spaces, created through the project itself, and in the imagination of
the visitors.
Jennifer Terry points to the project’s importance in terms of representing and in-
terrogating Brandon’s role within the formation of subcultural circles and identities,
in particular “the sometimes conflictual, sometimes allied formations of transgender
politics, lesbian-feminist politics, and butch identity politics.”30 This is also a key
aspect of BRANDON’s reception within the context of other media narratives on
Brandon.31 BRANDON seizes upon the aesthetic potential of digitized hypermedia
(i.e., invoking multiple and simultaneous levels of narration reconfigured both by cu-
rators and by publics) to problematize the social construction of a stable identity in
the real world. The project accomplishes this in part by making audiences aware of
their acceptance of technologies and virtual spaces as sites for constructing social reali-
ty. The shifting interfaces of both documentation and fiction require visitors to re-
spond interactively to these narratives, but also, more importantly, to probe and nego-
tiate their conflicting voices. Thus, BRANDON facilitates an investigation of the way
identities and their representations are constructed, communicated, and mediated by
technology.
One way of assessing the impact of such projects will be to examine the way
publics actually do respond to and intervene in the process of virtual representation.
Many media curators recognize that the aesthetic strategies of digital exhibitions re-
quire “a new metaphor,” providing different paths for navigating, exploring, and in-
teracting with the resources of the site rather than structuring the exhibition in a pri-
marily linear fashion (Gradwohl and Feldman 1998, 189). This also implies a changing
role for media artists, who perform multiple roles as producers, programmers, collabo-
rators, and facilitators.32 Virtual projects on the scale of BRANDON must also be
willing to risk a certain degree of danger or chaos from external and in some cases
threatening voices in response to online art. At the same time, projects themselves can
be interventions in virtual spaces. Robert Atkins observes that “on-line art is the most
hybrid of all media; one in which production and distribution, economics, design and
esthetics hopelessly—and intriguingly—intertwine” (1998, 89). Like media art pre-
sented in real spaces, virtual art must also work against itself, deconstruct its own rela-
 Cybersponsoring 231

tions, in order to reveal its own mechanisms and the way our reception and inter-
action with existing technologies have already conditioned our expectations, and in
doing so it will provoke interventions that question the boundaries and politics of real
and virtual spaces.

Corporate Cultural Politics in Cyberspace

Technology transfer—from corporations to artists’ virtual studios or to museums, as
well as the transfer of “cultural software” from artists and museums back into corpo-
rations—represents only one dimension of corporate interests in disseminating and
commodifying electronic technologies. Moreover, the fusion of new modes of cultur-
al production and dissemination that gradually erase boundaries between forms of
digitized production and reception has by no means created an equal partnership of
collaboration among artists, virtual museums, and commercial interests. Although
cyberspace provides an aperture to interrogate corporate interests, it has become a
highly commodified space, offering new sites for the representation and articulation
of corporate politics. Corporate sponsors have simply applied their existing strategies
of corporate cultural politics to their online operations, albeit with an exponentially
greater potential for dissemination.
Corporate sponsorships of media art projects utilize the notion of image transfer
within cyberspace by providing links to corporate Web sites. Whereas corporate names
and logos in print advertising for sponsored projects (e.g., exhibitions or performances)
rely on viewer associations with corporate image and product brands, the corporate
logo embedded as a digital link transfers the visitor to an expansive array of corporate
and product information with one click. Little is left to the imagination. In fact, cul-
tural institutions are often required to include corporate URLs in both their print
promotion and their Web site as one of many conditions of sponsorship. Ford Motor
Company, for example, designates the precise wording that sponsored programs must
use in acknowledging sponsorship and requires that it stand alone (i.e., not in con-
junction with other text or acknowledgement of other sponsors): “To learn more
about Ford Motor Company, [exhibition name] and other programs made possible by
Ford Motor Company, visit www.ford.com.” In addition, museums or other spon-
sored organizations are required to give Ford “on disk, graphic images to be placed on
the Ford Web site representing the exhibition or program and the organization
logo.” 33 Thus, the museum’s logo and the image of its exhibition provide a validation
of the corporation’s status as a cultural producer and promoter. In addition to finan-
cial and product information, Web sites are platforms for promoting corporate inter-
ests in public policy. Ford invites applications for support from
groups or organizations designed to develop policies and programs on topics such as:
labor practices, school curricula, and new market areas. Ford Motor Company Fund
support is intended to help implement these new ideas and recommendations to better
serve the needs of our changing population.34
232 Cybersponsoring

Within the promotional discourse of community relations, communications tech-

nologies are represented as vehicles of economic access and democracy. Bell Atlantic
promotes technology as “break[ing] the barrier between the haves and the have
nots.”35 Apart from placing computers in schools to make students computer literate
or supporting senior-citizen programs for computer literacy, Bell Atlantic funds mu-
seum projects linking schools with the museums. The Bell Atlantic Foundation is
particularly involved in funding arts and community projects that will apply communi-
cations technologies to their programs. These sponsorships illustrate that the commu-
nications industry is concerned not only with disseminating information technologies
but also, more significantly, with organizing how that communication is structured
and occurs.
Although the Internet has frequently been considered a space for establishing
utopian, virtual communities and forms of social interaction, there is no doubt that
more dystopian scenarios, such as corporate efforts to structure access and forms of
interaction within these spaces, are well underway. One of the ways the Internet is
being structured as a site of consumption is through the “portal” sites providing access
to a variety of additional services—essentially channeling user requests for informa-
tion or entertainment along predetermined paths:
Under the pretext of “more comfort” and “easier operation,” it is really a matter of en-
tangling the user in a comprehensive network of dependencies, which ultimately will
have the objective of involving the use of as many products linked to this firm, whether
browsers, e-mail clients, site or server. (Medosch 1998, 6)

User profiles and interactions are tracked in order to establish “branded communi-
ties,” i.e., communities of people with similar patterns of use and consumption
(Medosch 1998, 3–4). Thus, Internet use will increasingly be used for market research,
recording visits to sites, purchasing patterns, or browsing activities. Personal interests,
down to the most minute details, may not only be tracked but also channeled to spe-
cific forms of consumption (e.g., the burgeoning market in global cybersex).36 Cul-
tural institutions can determine the potential interests of audiences for virtual and real
exhibitions by tracking use on their sites, and sponsors can use this data in assessing
the effectiveness of cultural productions in accessing their target markets. In terms of
Internet access, Medosch predicts a general trend toward uniformity, which is in part
based on the increasing concentration of services within the hands of relatively few
major global players, such as Microsoft and Disney (1998, 2, 4–8). Although it is un-
likely that the Internet or its successors can become completely dominated by trans-
national communications corporations, individual users may have to become more
resourceful in “navigating” and creating alternative spaces within cyberspace.
Moreover, the emergence of transnational corporations conducting much of their
business in cyberspace (Pruitt and Barrett 1992, 408) poses a paradox for corporations
that restrict sponsorships to sites where they maintain operations. The expansion of on-
line consumption—and the elimination of wholesale and retail operations—transfers
many, albeit not all, of these sites of exchange into cyberspace. Simultaneously, manu-
 Cybersponsoring 233

facturing and data-processing operations are increasingly subcontracted and shifted

globally. If the corporation legitimizes sponsorships (cultural and social) through local
“investments” in communities, how are those locales defined when corporate capital
exchange occurs in cyberspace? Such contradictions will in all likelihood actually in-
crease corporations’ need to maintain forms of representation in real spaces (e.g., as
global corporations have done in Berlin) in order to assert their legitimacy, as well as to
protect their political and economic interests. Of course, themed environments (in-
cluding new hybrids of the virtual and the real), which increasingly merge with other
spaces of social interaction (e.g., education and culture), will continue to present site-
specific opportunities for articulating corporate cultural politics.37
To what extent cyberspace can provide new spaces for fostering critical discourse
in virtual communities is, at best, an open question. Based on Jürgen Habermas’s no-
tion of the public sphere, Howard Rheingold refers to the “commodification of public
discourse” within the electronic media and, by extension, virtual communities. In-
deed, he asserts that the notion that communications technologies are inherently
democratic, rather than structured by economic and political interests, is a myth per-
petuated by those interests:
The great weakness of the idea of electronic democracy is that it can be more easily
commodified than explained. The commercialization and commoditization of public
discourse is only one of the grave problems posed by the increasing sophistication of
communications media. The Net that is a marvelous lateral network can also be used as
a kind of invisible yet inescapable cage. (Rheingold 1994, 289)

By facilitating the transfer of economic and cultural capital to media technologies and
communications networks (increasingly controlled by transnational corporations),
cyberspace may limit critical cultural practices by marginalizing other forms of site-
specific, community-based culture in a more radical fashion than has occurred with
the introduction of other media. Yet this development could also lead to a greater
consciousness of place in constituting individual and collective identities and to the
desire to participate in the construction of those places.
Finally, the convergence of cultural politics, based on the consensus of economic
rationales—among corporations, foundations, arts institutions, and governments—
further complicates communications policy issues. Artists and cultural institutions
will have to negotiate many of the following issues with respect to electronic commu-
nication: (1) access, (2) diversity, (3) equity, (4) civic discourse, (5) freedom of expres-
sion, (6) privacy, and (7) copyright (Larson 1997, 119–25). Although the NEA recog-
nizes the communicative potential of the Internet for museums and local cultural
organizations, its report on the state of the arts at the outset of the twenty-first cen-
tury, American Canvas, pointed to the marginalization of alternative cultural expression
within U.S. communications policy. Indeed, nonprofit cultural organizations were
largely denied a voice in the U.S. government’s blueprint for communications policy
for decades to come (i.e., in the Telecommunications Act of 1996) (Larson 1997, 114;
Gaskin 1997, 214–19, 236–39). Citing the commercial development and concentration
234 Cybersponsoring

of the cable industry, the NEA warned that local and national arts institutions will be
at an economic and technological disadvantage unless they can form effective collabo-
rations (Larson 1997, 114). In contrast to public broadcasting in the United States and
Germany (where public television played a leading role), the development of the
Internet is now being driven by commercial interests or public-private collaborations.
And it is precisely this growing convergence, indeed fusion, of public, commercial,
and nonprofit cultural programming and administration that will define the cultural
landscape for the foreseeable future. As cyberlaw expert Lawrence Lessig points out in
his book Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace (1999), the realm of cyberspace, and its
increasing impact on everyday life, is an area that most governments are either unwill-
ing or unable to regulate. Yet the consequences of coming to terms with fundamental
regulatory issues will have a profound impact on the realities of public discourse, pri-
vacy, and democracy:
We will watch as important aspects of privacy and free speech are erased by the emerg-
ing architecture of the panopticon, and we will speak, like modern Jeffersons, about
nature making it so—forgetting that here, we are nature. We will in many domains of
our social life come to see the Net as the product of something alien—something we
cannot direct because we cannot direct anything. Something instead that we must sim-
ply accept, as it invades and transforms our lives. (Lessig 1999, 233)

The End of Sponsoring?

The expansion of corporate sponsorship in the United States, in Germany, and
throughout much of the EU during the last two decades of the twentieth century re-
flects the growing significance of cultural programming as a function of corporate cul-
tural politics. As we have seen, corporate funding in various forms has become indis-
pensable for most large projects, accounting for roughly 70 percent of total costs for
many museum exhibitions (Museo Guggenheim Bilbao 1997, chapter 6, page 3). The
emergence and articulation of corporate cultural politics were increasingly visible as
sponsorships, once defined primarily as philanthropy, became a part of the institu-
tional networks of community relations, that is, as social sponsoring or forms of
cause-related marketing. Many corporate-nonprofit “partnerships” now include both
cultural and social sponsorships, or even merge them. For example, Philip Morris’s
“Arts against Hunger” campaign, referred to in chapter 1, offers discounted tickets to
art museum exhibitions in return for contributions to local food drives. Such projects
reflect public-policy discourse and a degree of consensus (within corporations and
government) that define institutional legitimacy in terms of social issues and market
acceptance.38 In order to maintain institutional legitimacy and access funding, the
NEA reports that a majority of LAAs now include collaborations with social agencies
as part of their programs and funding requests (e.g., agencies for cultural and racial
awareness, youth at risk, economic development, crime prevention, illiteracy, AIDS,
environment, or substance abuse).39
Figure 7.4. Guggenheim’s Web site for sponsors. Copyright The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, New York.
236 Cybersponsoring

Obviously, corporations have vested interests in organizing the contexts of social

relations locally (within and surrounding their sites of production) as well as globally.
Yet they have also found that the public-policy arena is at times a volatile one. Public
policy has come into conflict with specific forms of product promotion and consump-
tion (e.g., tobacco, alcohol, environmental resources) and challenged the social rela-
tions of corporate power (e.g., with respect to affirmative action, sexual harassment,
and diversity). Other more limited challenges, emanating from public-interest organi-
zations, have exposed the underlying economic and social practices of corporate poli-
tics, such as labor practices in clothing manufacturing.40 We have also seen that youth
subcultures, a significant market for corporate products, images, and services, can also
be a potential source of subversion of commercial products. This is most apparent in
the growing resistance to brands and logos, as well as to the power of the Net. Naomi
Klein has traced the contours of an emerging resistance to corporate globalization
through the disparate agendas of numerous groups and subcultures:
Ethical shareholders, culture jammers, street reclaimers, McUnion organizers, human-
rights hacktivists, school-logo fighters and Internet corporate watchdogs are at the early
stages of demanding a citizen-centered alternative to the international rule of the
brands. That demand . . . is to build a resistance . . . that is as global, and as capable
of coordinated action, as the multinational corporations it seeks to subvert. (1999,
445–46)

The coalescence of these interests was most visible in demonstrations against the
World Trade Organization (WTO) in Seattle (1999), in Washington D.C. (2000), and
in Genoa, Italy (2001). As a result of experience with the tobacco industry, among
others, there is also a growing awareness of the power of other corporate sectors in
the social relations of everyday life (e.g., agribusiness and developers of genetically
modified products, the pharmaceutical and health care industries, or the media). Al-
though years of sustained efforts by some organizations have shown tangible results,
for example, in ethical investment policies for nonprofit investment funds, the degree
to which more substantive institutional changes are occurring (in both public and
corporate spheres) remains questionable.
The convergence of interests among corporate cultural production, nonprofit or-
ganizations, and public institutions has been a recurring theme of this study. Adminis-
trative, promotional, technological, and curatorial strategies of museums illustrate this
convergence with respect to corporate cultural politics. Major museums have gradu-
ally assumed corporate structures in order to guarantee their fiscal stability. And the
fact that many major corporate donors sit on museum boards or serve as museum
trustees has undoubtedly contributed to this development (Museo Guggenheim Bilbao
1997, 6.3). Museum administrators increasingly operate in cultural as well as corporate
environments. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, for example, named a former IBM
executive as chief operating officer with the title of president reporting to the chief
executive.41 In Germany and the EU, the privatization of public institutions has also
 Cybersponsoring 237

fueled the growing dependence of museums, operas, and theaters on private and cor-
porate funding and led to new public-corporate models, such as the Kunstmuseum
Wolfsburg. Milan’s La Scala opera was transformed from a state opera into a nonprofit
arts foundation in which private contributors (both individual donors and corporate
sponsors) provide up to 40 percent of the house’s budget. La Scala donors have a voice
in the foundation; however, they must make a minimum contribution of $500,000.
Not surprisingly, many of the major donors and participants in the foundation are cor-
porations (particularly banks, electrical corporations, or fashion designers Armani and
Prada).42 Italy is gradually adopting the U.S. model of cultural financing for most of its
opera houses and is attracting corporate funding in part by allowing a larger percentage
of donations to nonprofits as tax deductions. During the 1980s and 1990s, many cor-
porations transferred some sponsorship activities to foundations (e.g., Germany’s
Lufthansa, which was also privatized). Others, like the Ford Motor Company Fund
(not affiliated with the Ford Foundation) date back to 1949.
Corporate administrative models are now setting the standard for many private
cultural foundations, which, through their funding guidelines, tend to favor “admin-
istrative-heavy” and “art-light” organizations, to the detriment of smaller, alternative,
artist-run programs (Atkins 1998, 59). The impact of private foundations as a funding
source in the United States, and their growing importance throughout the EU, is
underscored by the following statistics, which have contributed to what American
Canvas terms a “laissez-faire philanthropy that at times, appears to be more oligarchic
than democratic . . . [favoring] a comparatively small number of large flagship institu-
tions, located in a handful of cities, that dominate their fields, artistically as well as fi-
nancially” (Larson 1997, 156–57).
• Twenty-five foundations (approximately 0.07 percent of the total number) provide
40 percent of all arts funding.
• Fifty arts organizations (approximately 1 percent of all grantees) receive 32 percent of
the funding.
• Five states accounted for 65 percent of all arts funding awarded. (Larson 1997, 156)

Although Germany still maintains significant levels of public funding, the importance
of foundations and corporate sponsorships for new projects (museums and arts cen-
ters), as well as for museum acquisitions and exhibitions, is increasing dramatically and
will in all likelihood continue to do so in the coming decades (Heinrichs 1997, v–vi).43
In the United States, a significant percentage of donations to nonprofit cultural
and community organizations comes from individuals rather than corporations.
However, their interests are only represented through advisory boards, if at all. In con-
trast, wealthy donors can exert considerable influence, counterbalancing the voices of
individual donors, through a single large contribution, frequently augmented by sup-
port from the corporations they manage or own. Despite the best intentions to re-
spond to a diversity of voices, many local arts organizations remain largely within the
238 Cybersponsoring

control of an elite group of more-affluent arts “patrons.” The failure of many local
arts groups to garner broad-based support for their programs has been attributed to
their inability to fully embrace ethnic and socioeconomic diversity in their organiza-
tions.44 Obviously, middle- and lower-income groups have not historically been a tar-
get market for fund-raisers. Similar trends are evident in Germany and the EU, where
wealthy patrons who were once influential in museum foundations (i.e., Friends of
the Museum) are now shifting support to their own corporate cultural programs,
which have a higher visibility (Grasskamp 1998, 74–75).
I would argue that less-affluent donors (who may make modest individual dona-
tions but who account for a significant portion of funding when considered as a
group) must attempt to assert their interests collectively, particularly within larger or-
ganizations, by demanding a greater voice in governance, administration, and pro-
gramming. The collective articulation of these interests is admittedly difficult, given
the often conflicting perspectives within memberships and communities. However,
the organization of individual “small” donors presents a productive potential for com-
munities to determine social and cultural agendas rather than allowing programs to be
driven largely by monied and corporate interests.45 In many instances, the total per-
centage of individual donations far outweighs corporate contributions, yet corpora-
tions (or foundations) can leverage their influence by providing a single funding block
for special programs or acquisitions.46 Obviously, a museum or symphony will be
more concerned when a corporate sponsor or wealthy patron withdraws funding than
when an individual donor does so. Yet an organized action by even 20 percent of the
“average” donors would indeed evoke a response from the museum board or its direc-
tor. Despite a system of cultural politics based largely on corporate and nonprofit
organizations, individuals of lesser means can indeed assert their interests, but only
through forms of collective participation that also leverage their joint capital. This
process is a first step not only in gaining a voice within community affairs but also in
establishing an environment for expanding its membership to more diverse publics—
and in doing so, providing a broader, democratic, and more-inclusive participation in
society and culture.
In Germany, where local civic and cultural organizations have played a less impor-
tant role than in the United States, collective political action has taken the form of
local citizen action groups, Bürgerinitiativen (usually focused on a particular issue).
However, they have not, for the most part, provided funding for cultural or social
programs. Many of the new models proposed for funding culture in Germany (and in
many EU countries) are variations of government, corporate, and private models
from the United States and the United Kingdom, including (1) combinations of
public-private foundations or institutions, (2) institutional funding based on endow-
ments to maintain continuity with additional funding for special projects derived
from multiple sources (government, corporate, individual, foundation), (3) incentives
for matching funds and “partnerships,” (4) increased tax deductions for various forms
of cultural programming (including donations, sponsoring, foundations), (5) improved
 Cybersponsoring 239

legal guarantees for nonprofit organizations, and (6) measures to promote expertise,
with respect to funding and administration, in managing cultural institutions (Hein-
richs 1997, 248–50). Here too, communities will have to articulate their own interests
and participate in developing alternative models as new constellations for organizing
and financing culture emerge.
Cultural and social programs within corporations, such as corporate art collections
and arts programming, present another context within which communities may assert
their interests. Corporations have only begun to recognize that such programs (e.g.,
“art in the workplace” programs) are rarely effective without employee participation in
their conceptualization and implementation. Some initiatives, such as projects devel-
oped by artists Clegg and Guttman at the DG Bank or Vitra’s Design Museum, may
facilitate a greater consciousness of cultural spaces within the workplace (apart from
“corporate culture”) and their relations to other social spaces. Indeed, the two are inex-
tricably linked. However, such tentative interventions will only be successful to the ex-
tent that corporate managements are interested in facilitating a dialogue—among and
with employees—on the implications of culture and the workplace locally and on the
role of corporations globally. This process implies not only an openness to conflicting
voices but also a willingness to examine the corporations’ own interests. Cultural pro-
duction can play an important role in initiating and mediating such discussions.
However, such programs must become more than just internal sponsorships—that is,
another medium for corporate cultural politics and self-promotion linked with em-
ployee incentives (e.g., concert tickets, vacations, or products). To the extent that cul-
ture is allowed to become a catalyst for a critical dialogue in the workplace, such con-
ceptual shifts (in the social organization of the workplace) would eventually lead to a
different perception of how the corporation perceives its function within society.
Sponsoring has become a given, embedded in the sociocultural fabric, and an inte-
gral part of institutional survival for public and nonprofit institutions. An important
indicator of its growth and legitimacy has been the significant increase of cultural and
social programming within smaller and medium-sized firms (Business Committee for
the Arts 1998, 9). Despite the ongoing waves of mergers in most business sectors, over-
all spending for sponsorships continues to increase, in part due to the higher levels of
participation by medium-sized firms and the new high-tech corporations. No longer
limited to multinational corporations, sponsorships have become a systemic feature of
corporate cultural politics, operating both in local and global contexts. Although
sponsoring’s legitimacy is routinized and institutionally reinforced, its proliferation
also exposes the extent to which corporations construct and organize everyday life.
Although challenges to corporate cultural programming—resulting from a shift-
ing cultural terrain or forms of public resistance—may lead to the evolution of other
forms of cultural programming (employing similar strategies) with new corporate des-
ignations, it is unlikely that they will signal an end to the objectives of cultural spon-
sorships or corporate cultural politics. If most institutionally sanctioned art becomes
“sponsored” in one form or another, then the communicative potential of sponsoring
240 Cybersponsoring

as an instrument of corporate promotion is relativized. I have suggested that one of

the paradoxes of cultural programming is that corporations attempt to capture art as
an auratic field in order to instrumentalize its symbolic power for corporate commu-
nication. However, the intensity and duration of art’s communicative potential is
undermined by the corporation’s own interests in consumer and media culture. This
means that cultural programming, if it is to be an effective instrument of communica-
tion, must operate on the boundaries between subcultures, the avant-garde, alterna-
tive culture, and promotional culture (Wernick 1991). I have also argued that this
function of sponsorships explains much of the attraction and success of postmodern
culture, that is, its dual roles as “complicity and critique” (Hutcheon 1991), for cor-
porate sponsors. Yet, it is precisely at this intersection of the subversive and the promo-
tional—also a significant dimension of event culture—that corporate interests and
cultural politics become visible and vulnerable.
This heightened visibility provides an aperture for the interrogation of corporate
cultural politics and social relations. The question becomes how such apertures can
be employed to engage audiences in a consideration of their own positions within
this process. We have seen that some artists have seized these strategic opportunities
in order to destabilize corporate representation and organization of social spaces.
Though many such projects remain tentative, they perform an important function
by identifying and experimenting with strategies and modes of aesthetic communica-
tion that at once illuminate and undermine the representation of corporate interests.
Site-specific works, such as those of Hans Haacke, facilitate this awareness by identi-
fying and appropriating the social spaces in which culture and politics intersect and by
then deconstructing them. In postunification Germany, the Parliament (Bundestag)
has recognized the power of culture and its public representation, as evidenced by an
unprecedented number of debates on cultural projects during the 1990s: Christo and
Jeanne-Claude’s Wrapped Reichstag, Peter Eisenman’s Holocaust Memorial, or Haacke’s
installation for the Reichstag, Der Bevölkerung. In this regard, we should also not lose
sight of the potential for alternative interventions in sponsored culture and for more
diverse participation in cultural institutions at local or regional levels, while partici-
pating in organized actions and collaborations with other communities and interest
groups at the macro levels (i.e., nationally and globally). Despite the significance of
cyberspace, the material, real sites of cultural production, mediation, and reception re-
main a crucial dimension of cultural politics.
The fact that corporations have played a fundamental role in shaping the contexts
of cultural production, distribution, and reception is not new. However, to a certain
extent, sponsoring can only maintain its legitimacy by perpetuating the myth that
corporations and culture operate within separate spheres, that is, that the intersection
of culture and politics in the form of corporate cultural politics does not exist, or that
corporate interests inherently work for the public good. Thus, sponsoring simultane-
ously reveals and belies (represses) the links between corporate and cultural produc-
tion. The admission that they are intertwined, although by no means identical, would
 Cybersponsoring 241

ultimately lead to a legitimacy crisis by focusing attention on the corporation as a site

of cultural production and mediation rather than deflecting this participation away
from the corporation to other spaces.47
In this respect, the convergence of institutional interests (corporate, nonprofit/
foundation, and public) and their transformation into new hybrid organizations must
also be considered in terms of their potential for public interventions and renegotia-
tions, rather than allowing them to become sites for the colonization of cultural and
nonprofit institutions—essentially coextensive with corporate space. The focus on cul-
ture, emanating from the corporation as well as from public policy, provides an oppor-
tunity for individuals and communities to “turn the tables” and interrogate the way
corporations themselves produce culture and structure everyday life. At the outset of
this book, I suggested that “full disclosure” (i.e., financial disclosure by sponsors, cul-
tural institutions, and foundations related to sponsored projects) is a necessary first
step in this process. Yet full disclosure alone will not lead to a true democratization of
cultural institutions. This can only be approached as individuals and communities,
including artists, assume a greater responsibility for and demand a voice in the institu-
tions of culture. Thus, artists, cultural mediators, and publics must see their participa-
tion in cultural institutions of all kinds not merely in economic terms (e.g., as dona-
tions or funding objectives) but also as a form of empowerment that has implications
beyond institutional sites (e.g., of the museum, symphony hall, or festival). Paradoxi-
cally, cultural production itself can perform a crucial role in this process by provoking
audiences to interrogate and reconsider their own positions with respect to culture
and in doing so contribute to a redefinition of private, public, and corporate spaces.
This page intentionally left blank
 Notes

1. Full Disclosure
1. See Stuart Elliott, “Tired of Being a Villain, Philip Morris Works on Its Image,” New
York Times, 11 November 1999 (online; available: http://www.nytimes.com; 6 July 2001).
2. After a decade of debate (1989–1999) on the Holocaust Memorial, Peter Eisenman’s
proposal for a Forest of Pillars, along with a small House of Information, was approved by the
German parliament. Although I do not address the role of the Holocaust Memorial explicitly,
it was a key part of the discourses surrounding German identity during the 1990s. See also the
debate in the parliament on artist Hans Haacke’s installation in a courtyard of the Reichstag,
der bevölkerung (To the Population), referencing the inscription over the main entrance,
which reads “dem deutschen volke” (To the German people). Roger Cohen, “Poking Fun,
Artfully, at a Heady German Word,” New York Times, 31 March 2000.
3. Listings in the Europäische Sponsoring-Börse (ESB, European Sponsoring Exchange)
(online; available: http://www.esb-online.com; 6 July, 2001) provide ample evidence that
many aspects of cultural and social life in Germany (e.g., education in the new states) are in-
creasingly supported through corporate donations.
4. Judith H. Dobrzynski, “Ford Devotes $40 Million More to Art,” New York Times,
3 May 2000 (online; available: http://www.nytimes.com; 3 May 2000).
5. For example, Paul G. Allen, cofounder of Microsoft, established six charitable founda-
tions, including the Allen Foundation for the Arts and the Experience Music Project Foun-
dation, which funded the Experience Music Project building in Seattle, designed by Frank
Gehry. See Paul G. Allen Foundation Web site: http://www.paulallen.com/foundations/
main.asp (6 July 2001).
6. “Intel Chips In for Whitney Show,” Art in America, November 1998, 52. See also the
Intel Corporation Web site: http://www.intel.com/pressroom/archive/releases/CO092498.
HTM; 9 September 2001. Corporate expenditures for all event sponsorships (including sports)
had already exceeded $3 billion by the mid-1990s (Schreiber 1994, 1).
7. “NEA Gives Final Grants for 2000,” Art in America, July 2000, 128. Congressional re-
organization of the NEA in 1996 required that individual artists apply for grants through their
local arts organizations, thereby creating greater administrative control and bureaucratization
(Siegel 1996, 168).
8. Cultural institutions face a number of issues regarding partnerships with social organi-
zations, issues ranging from appropriate selection criteria for partners to the types of programs
that should be offered to administrative costs. Indeed, most larger cultural institutions (muse-
ums, symphonies) already maintain programs for community education and outreach. Will

243
244 Notes to Chapter 1

new programs dilute their institutional mission and focus? Will they indeed increase the per-
ception of “legitimacy,” and will this lead to greater funding or support?
9. My view regarding the legitimization of social programming and corporate sponsor-
ship is also argued by George Yúdice (1999, 17, 32).
10. I will also examine how the interests of corporations and cultural institutions are con-
verging as the latter have adapted corporate administrative procedures, promotional strategies,
and technologies. However, this does not mean they are equal partners.
11. There was extensive domestic and international media coverage of Sensation. See, for
example, Stephanie Cash, “Art under Siege in New York: ‘Sensation’ Battle Erupts in Brook-
lyn,” Art in America, November 1999, 37–41; David Barstow, “Brooklyn Museum Recruited
Donors Who Stood to Gain,” New York Times, 31 October 1999 (online; available: http://
www.nytimes.com; 31 October, 1999). Michael Kimmelman, “In the End, the ‘Sensation’ Is
More in the Money,” New York Times, 3 November 1999; Lynn Macritchie, “Ofili’s Glittering
Icons,” Art in America, January 2000, 96–101.
12. See Barstow, “Brooklyn Museum Recruited Donors Who Stood To Gain.”
13. Quoted in Carol Vogel, “Australian Museum Cancels Controversial Art Show,” New
York Times, 1 December 1999 (online; available at: http://www.nytimes.com; 1 December 1999).
14. Rolf Zwirner, “Wo bleibt der Wertekanon? Das Museum als Spielplatz fremder
Interessen: Wenn Sammler dominieren,” Die Welt, 2 February 1999 (online; available: http://
www.welt.de; 10 March 1999).
15. See Barstow, “Brooklyn Museum Recruited Donors Who Stood To Gain.”
16. Vera Graaf, “Enthüllungen: Skandal um Brooklyn Museum,” Süddeutsche Zeitung,
8 December 1999 (online; available: http://www.sueddeutsche.de; 8 December 1999).
17. Marion Leske, “Warum Saatchi immer gewinnt: Geschlossenes Erfolgssystem. Der
Londoner Händler und Sammler spannt die Kunstszene für sich ein,” Die Welt, 16 November
1998 (online; available: http://www.welt.de; 8 December 1999).
18. Cited in Thomas Veser, “Raus aus dem Reservat! Eine Berlelsmann-Tagung sucht
nach einem neuen Rollenverständnis von Stiftungen,” Berliner Tagesspiegel, 19 July 2000; see
also http://www.bertelsmann-stiftung.de; 6 July 2001.
19. See Herbert Muschamp, “Where Ego Sashays in Style,” New York Times (weekend
edition), 20 October 2000.
20. Roberta Smith comments, “Nearly 250 of the 450 ensembles date from 1995, another
160 from 1990 to 1994. If Mr. Armani is so desperate to be seen as an artist, he should have al-
lowed himself to be treated as one. That would have meant taking a back seat to the curators
who, one hopes, would have selected a smaller show, included earlier designs and his work for
other labels, and emphasized his development with a chronological installation. As it is, once
you’ve looked at all the bead work, the show reduces to an exceptional Robert Wilson instal-
lation.” See Roberta Smith, “Memo to Art Museums: Don’t Give Up on Art,” New York Times,
3 December 2000.
21. Smith, “Memo to Art Museums.”
22. See Brian Wallis, Hans Haacke: Unfinished Business (New York: New Museum of
Contemporary Art, 1986).
23. See, for example, Black’s Law Dictionary: Definitions of the Terms and Phrases of
American and English Jurisprudence, Ancient and Modern, 4th ed. (St. Paul, Minn.: West Pub-
lishing, 1986), 51.
24. See Roger Cohen, “Poking Fun, Artfully, at the Heady German Word,” New York
Times, 21 March 2000.
25. Matthias Arning: “Appelle der früheren Zwangsarbeiter treffen auf Ignoranz,”
 Notes to Chapter 2 245

Frankfurter Rundschau, 25 February 2001 (online; available: http://www.fr-aktuell.de; 25 Feb-

ruary 2001). See also, “Contributions Slow for Nazi Fund,” New York Times, 28 May 2000 (on-
line; available: http://www.nytimes.com; 28 May 2000).
26. “Intel Chips In for Whitney Show,” 152.
27. See Rudolf von Thadden, “Deutschland ist eine Nation westlichen Typs geworden,”
Frankfurter Rundschau, 10 June 2000 (online; available: http://www.fr-aktuell.de; 10 June
2000).
28. I would argue that Europe (or other nations) may not be as willing to embrace U.S.
leadership in public-policy development as Friedman suggests, particularly in health or envi-
ronmental issues—as the widespread public rejection of genetically modified food products
(including those from the United States) illustrates. Nor are Europeans willing to accept un-
conditionally the United States, “at its best,” as a “spiritual value and role model” (Friedman
2000, 474).

2. Corporate Cultural Politics

1. The example of the Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, financed largely through funding by
the Holler Stiftung, is discussed in chapter 6. Regarding changes in tax laws and donations to
culture, see “Bedingungen für Mäzene verbessert: Bundestag verabschiedet neues Stiftungs-
gesetz,” Das Parlament 2000, 30 March 2000 (online; available: http://www.das-parlament.de;
27 April 2000).
2. The collective interests of individual donors are underrepresented because they are
not institutionally organized (see chapter 7).
3. See, for example, public reaction in Germany to Shell’s announcement that the
drilling platform Brent Spar would be sunk. The reaction included boycotts of Shell gas sta-
tions and products by politically conservative, moderate, and liberal Germans concerned
about environmental issues and ultimately led to the corporation’s reconsideration of its plan
and subsequently to a public relations campaign designed to position Shell as socially respon-
sible. Ulrich Beck, “Der grüne Spaltpilz,” Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 8–9 July 1995; Heidi
Blattmann, “Brent Spar: Ein Erfolg für die Umwelt?” Kulturchronik 5 (1995); Ursula Ott,
“Gute Tat ist teuer,” Die Woche, 24 November 1995.
4. In its sponsorship guidelines, Ford Motor Company requires use of its logo and a cred-
it line in all materials and also reserves the right to use the sponsorship in its own promotional
information. Ford has the right to approve and reject all images for catalog covers and exhibi-
tion advertising. Such images must be consonant with the corporate identity: “Consultation
with Ford Motor Company is requested to define images and/or graphics created for a cohesive
marketing effort in regards to posters, invitations, advertising copy, etc.” At the opening of
some events, Ford reserves the right to display vehicles at the entrance to the organization. See
“Ford Motor Company Sponsorship Guidelines” Ford Fund annual report, 4 December 1998
(online; available: http://www.ford.com/corporate-info/culture/find/guidecorpcon.html;
4 December 1998).
5. I will use the term “community” to refer to larger social groups that may encompass
or cut across subcultures and milieus (e.g., with respect to ethnicity or geography). The exis-
tence of community frequently implies social integration, coherence, and cohesion. It can also
be a force for the containment of social conflict, rather than a basis for democratic social ac-
tion. Sarah Thornton suggests that subcultures, in comparison to communities, tend to ex-
press struggles over territory, place, and space, particularly within urban communities, even
threatening established notions of neighborhood (1997, 2). I use “community” primarily in
reference to constructing shared interests and empowerment. Here, David Morley and Kevin
246 Notes to Chapter 2

Robins refer to the work of Eileen and Stephen Yeo in arguing that “it is ‘community made by
people for themselves’” (1995, 182; see also Eileen and Stephen Yeo, “On the Uses of ‘Com-
munity’: From Owenism to the Present,” in New Views of Co-operation, ed. Stephen Yeo
[London: Routledge, 1988], 230–31; and Berman 1992, 274–76). The distinction between com-
munity interests organized by corporations or institutional political interests primarily from
outside communities versus those that develop out of discourses that articulate competing
interests from within communities, and attempts to implement those interests through
community-based and community-directed initiatives, is a key one. On a different plane,
“community” also refers to regional and national entities as well as the construction of virtual
communities (Morley and Robins 1995, 182–88, 132–33)
6. With regard to public policy and corporate interest, see Larson 1997, 54–55.
7. John McCormick, “Take a BMW for a Spin To Help Cancer Fund-Raiser,” Des Moines
Register, 14 June 1997.
8. In partial response to media criticism of sponsoring, fifty major German and multi-
national corporations (e.g., DaimlerChrysler, Volkswagen, and Hoechst, as well as the German
subsidiaries of IBM and Sony) established a “Working Group on Cultural Sponsoring” in 1998
to create a “Code of Conduct” that (1) asked other corporations to increase long-term spon-
soring programs to offset government budget cuts, (2) established the responsibilities and ex-
pectations of corporations and the sponsored, and (3) stated that corporations should not in-
fringe on the autonomy of artists and cultural institutions, but that the cultural community
should recognize sponsoring “not [as] disinterested philanthropy but a business strategy to
bolster firms’ public images.” See “Major Corporations Issue Sponsoring Guidelines,” The
Week in Germany, 16 October 1998, 4.
9. This institutional convergence of museum and corporation is reinforced by corporate
leaders who chair museum boards, such as Leonard Lauder, CEO of Estée Lauder Co., who
chaired the Whitney Museum’s board. Philip Morris’s headquarters also house a branch of the
Whitney (Roth 1989, 362).
10. The ultimate fate of many of these studio spaces after corporate projects are complet-
ed (and promotional funds are exhausted) is at best uncertain.
11. Oren Yiftachel has shown that urban and regional planning has been utilized as
a means of territorial, procedural, and socioeconomic control by (1) spatially containing
minorities, (2) limiting minority access to decision-making and procedural processes, and
(3) privileging the economic and social interests of dominant groups in terms of land-
development politics (Yifchatel 1995, 220–21; see also Watson and Gibson 1995a, 258).
12. For a discussion of the role of leading postmodern architects engaged by Disney
(Robert A. M. Stern, Michael Graves, Charles Moore, Helmut Jahn, Arata Isozaki, and Frank
Gehry), see Waldrep 1995, 208–21.
13. Gerhard Matzig, “Die Retorte im Gesicht der Stadt,” Süddeutsche Zeitung, 30 Sep-
tember 1998, 12. In the development of the two largest projects (i.e., by Daimler and Sony),
Matzig sees an attempt to infuse the new Berlin Republic with the mythology and urbanity of
fin de siècle Berlin.
14. Part of Ford’s rationale in choosing city-center locations was to reach tourists and sub-
urbanites attending theater performances. Theaters in New York and Chicago were designed
“to enhance its image in the community and to increase access to the arts. Ford chose to spon-
sor theater because it is a major market for women and young people, who make up a large
percentage of Ford customers. As part of this sponsorship, Ford was able to showcase its vehi-
cles in the theaters’ lobbies and the Company name appeared on tickets for productions and in
media advertisements.” See “BCA News Excerpts,” 30 November 1998 (online; available:
http://www.bcainc.org; 30 November 1998).
 Notes to Chapter 2 247

15. Similarly, the proliferation of casino-entertainment complexes (beginning in Atlantic

City, N.J.) marked the expansion of themed environments beyond Las Vegas. Although osten-
sibly promoting economic development, many casino projects accelerated economic and so-
cial displacement by offering cheap real estate, tax abatements, low-paying jobs, and the out-
flow of corporate revenues, rather than promoting a balanced economic base and economic
infrastructure.
16. With regard to the analysis of postmodern architecture, see also Jameson 1997,
239–46; Charles Jenks, Language of Postmodern Architecture (London: Academy, 1978).
17. For agency information, see Strahlendorf 1992. The ESB provides an online exchange
at http://www.esb.online.com; 9 September 2001.
18. Deutsche Aerospace public relations publication “Visionen.”
19. “BMW Public Relations Information,” 1992.
20. BMW, “Kultur und Wirtschaft,” 5.
21. Ibid., 9.
22. Corporate case studies are provided in management literature on sponsoring. See
Bettina Becker 1994; Bruhn 1991; Grüßer 1992; Rauhe and Demmer 1994; Schreiber 1994.
23. Of course, all of the outward signs of the two firms were also merged (e.g., business
cards, stationery, and logos). Even a funeral wreath for a postmerger Daimler-Benz employee
included the new DaimlerChrysler logo. See Karl-Heinz Büschemann, “Aber es bleibt bei vier
Rädern,” Süddeutsche Zeitung, 18 November 1998.
24. In Search of Excellence also provided considerable reinforcement for the “total quality
management” philosophy, which, in the United States, was transferred from the corporate sec-
tor to universities and nonprofit organizations. See also Terrence E. Deal and Allan A. Ken-
nedy, Corporate Cultures: The Rights and Rituals of Corporate Life (New York: Perseus, 2000);
Thomas J. Peters and Robert H. Waterman, In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America’s Best-
Run Companies (New York: Harper and Row, 1982).
25. Timothy Brennan has argued that the transnationals still remain very much bound to
national economic, social, cultural, and political interests (1997, 161–62).
26. With regard to Höhler’s role as one of the leading German marketing experts and her
own self-promotion in management seminars, see Herbert Riehl-Heyse, “Warum Sieger leise
lächeln: Beobachtungen bei einem Seminar für Führungskräfte,” Süddeutsche Zeitung, 28 Oc-
tober 1992.
27. The German automobile industry claimed that a speed limit would result in industry
job losses. According to opinion polls, the German public is about equally divided regarding
speed limits on the Autobahn. See “Deutsche Autokonzerne gegen Tempolimit,” Süddeutsche
Zeitung, 12 October 1998.
28. BMW, “Kultur und Wirtschaft,” 4.
29. The International Directory of Corporate Art Collections lists over 1,250 corporate col-
lections internationally.
30. Regarding economic analyses of art collecting, see Heilbrun and Gray 1993, 149–68.
31. Frank Nicolaus, “Mit Kunst floriert auch das Geschäft,” ART, March 1990, 90–91
(cited in Bettina Becker 1994, 67–69).
32. See John Fiske with regard to forms of resistance within popular culture as “selective,
not wholesale—progressive, not radical” (1992, 214).
33. Ralf Dahrendorf, “‘Das ist ein Hammer,’” Der Spiegel, 11 May 1998, 110.
34. For descriptions of these projects, see Bourdieu and Haacke 1995, 96, 30, 120;
Buchloh 1997, 413–15. A discussion of Haacke’s work during the 1980s is included in Luke
1992, 152–68; Deustche 1998, 109–58, 159–92.
35. Grasskamp 1995, 145; Lacy 1996, 226; Deutsche 1998, 159–92.
248 Notes to Chapter 3

36. Haacke specifically references the links to National Socialism within the context of
Venice (Bourdieu and Haacke 1995, 125–44).
37. German industry’s German Holocaust Fund, established to compensate victims of
slave labor, also assumed a significant function within foreign and cultural policy in order to
validate corporate legitimacy (but also to forestall litigation in foreign courts and the portrayal
of negative images of major corporations). See “Contributions Slow for Nazi Fund,” New York
Times, 28 May 2000 (online; available: www.nytimes.com; 28 May 2000).

3. Redefining Culture, Absolutly

1. James Twitchell (1996) argues that “Adcult” has become synonymous and cotermi-
nous with culture, or at least, contemporary mass culture. “Adcult” also assumes that audi-
ences or communities can be theorized primarily as niche markets or subcultures of consump-
tion, and it accepts the premise of consumer culture as culture, without fully exploring
examples of resistance or disruption in greater depth.
2. See chapter 2, note 3.
3. Like Schulze, Scott Lash has investigated the process of cultural de-differentiation
(between high and popular culture) as a specific characteristic of postmodern culture (Lash
1991, 11–13). Yet as Lash, Schulze, Douglas Kellner, and other critics observe, de-differentiation
does not imply a reductive homogenization of culture.
4. A pathbreaking analysis of the discursive strategies of advertising was provided in
Williamson 1995.
5. “Eavesdropping” is used without evoking the negative reactions associated with “lis-
tening in” on telephone party lines (connections shared by multiple customers). In this sense,
it has quaint or antiquated allusions, unlike “wiretapping,” which is a more serious invasion of
privacy.
6. In particular, see Roberta Smith, “High and Low Culture Meet on a One-Way
Street,” New York Times, 5 October 1998.
7. Danto sees three historical developments: First, fin de siècle artists entered the field of
publicity (e.g., Henri Toulouse-Lautrec and the artists of the art nouveau style), which con-
tributed to the erasure of the boundary between high and applied art. Second, during the
1950s, advertising and promotion appropriated art, in a purely instrumental fashion, as a prop
or aesthetic style in order to market images and commodities. On the other hand, artists per-
ceived the relationship between art and advertising as “disjunctive.” Finally, artists appropriate
certain elements of advertising style or create counterfeits in order to destabilize the relation-
ship between the two (1993, 152–55).
8. In his review of the Guggenheim’s 1998 exhibition The Art of the Motorcycle (spon-
sored by BMW), James Hyde refers to the High and Low exhibition as only minimally incor-
porating a treatment of popular culture, whereas the Guggenheim marked a distinct shift in
“museological perspective” by dedicating itself exclusively to the popular culture of the motor-
cycle (1998, 95). However, The Art of the Motorcycle failed to incorporate a more critical repre-
sentation the motorcycle’s function in diverse cultural contexts. (See my discussion of the
Guggenheim in chapter 6.)
9. In another program engaging images of popular culture from the 1960s to 1990s,
AT&T (in collaboration with the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum) sponsored a
Covers Tour of 250 cover photographs from Rolling Stone. See the advertisement in Rolling
Stone, 22 January 1998, 63.
10. Susanne Wegerhoff (of American Express) writes, “The members’ certainty of belong-
ing to a privileged group with a cultivated enjoyment of life ensures the exclusivity of events
such as the Frank Sinatra concert” (Wegerhoff 1992b, 54).
 Notes to Chapter 3 249

11. Andrew Wernick writes, “The displacement of live performance by recording, of au-
ratic culture by the mechanically reproduced, has led to a countervailing nostalgia for the liv-
ing, the authentic, and the original” (1991, 115). Yet Wernick also observes that the audience an-
ticipates a rendition of the recorded version, which has become the “authentic” version (116).
12. Wernick employs the term “promotional culture” to analyze contemporary culture
with respect to common modes of communication and, more specifically, signification: “A
promotional message is a complex of significations which at once represents (moves in place
of ), advocates (moves on behalf of ), and anticipates (moves ahead of ) the circulating entity or
entities to which it refers” (1991, 182).
13. Donaher was referring to a new ad campaign for Crystall Vodka, where he was also
employing visual strategies similar to those used in the Absolut campaign (Lubow 1994, 68).
14. Other Absolut themes included cities; holidays; fashion; “themed-art,” that is, artists
who employed similar styles; artistic media, for example, sculpture; flavors; spectaculars;
Eurocities; film and literature; “tailor-made” advertisements, that is, designed for niche maga-
zines; “topicality,” that is, tied to media events, news (Lewis 1996, viii).
15. See chapter 2 for information on BMW’s “Art Cars.” With respect to best-sellers,
Werner Faulstich has identified the interaction of aesthetic innovation and schematization as
central characteristics of international best-sellers (e.g., the James Bond books, Airport, The
Godfather, Love Story); see Werner Faulstich, Innovation und Schema: Medienästhetische Unter-
suchungen (Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, 1987).
16. Roux’s investment in the artwork itself was minimal. On average, he paid about
$5,000 for the rights to a painting and never exceeded the price of the original Warhol
(Brown 1991, 129). By the early 1990s, he had commissioned work by more than three hun-
dred artists and spent approximately $400,000 a year on paintings—a bargain considering
that the total ad budget for Absolut was about $15 million several years later (Brown 1991, 129;
Tilsner 1994, 95).
17. As Roux himself admitted, the campaign was indeed advertising. Its objectives were
not oriented to any sort of continuous, long-term support of specific artists or their projects,
or related to the historical ideal of selfless patronage.
18. In Canada, Vin & Sprit threatened to sue Adbusters magazine (21,000 circulation) for
running a parody of the Absolut advertisements; the parody questioned the effects of alcohol
consumption. Subsequently, however, Absolut’s TBWA advertising agency stated, “Any expo-
sure for us is great exposure for Absolut.” See Barry Brown, “Magazine’s Parody Makes
Marketer Absolut-ely Mad,” Advertising Age, 27 July 1992, 3, 42.
19. Joe DiSabato, president of Rivendell Marketing (a major representative for gay media
publications), explained that most advertising and marketing executives have been reluctant to
place advertising in gay publications because they fear responses from antigay groups.
Advertisers like Absolut (or Saab, Suzuki, or ITT Sheraton) are exceptions (Johnson 1991, 31).
20. In the United States, corporations refer to sponsorships for social causes or nonprofit
organizations as “cause-related sponsorships.” In Germany, they are designated “social spon-
soring and social marketing.” Unlike corporate philanthropy, social sponsoring is directly tied
to marketing objectives. Corporate sponsorships, or “cause-related marketing,” programs,
which donate a specific percentage of sales to a nonprofit organization, are linked to a return-
on-investment that is measured in product recognition and sales. (American Express was one
of the first major corporations to employ this strategy.) Schreiber states that “these events are
not driven by foundations that are removed somewhere in the corporation. Corporate cause-
related sponsorship is now a mainstream marketing activity that serves a strategic, marketing
function within the corporation” (1994, 13).
21. See discussions of Benetton court cases in the EU: “Textilhersteller muss sittenwidrige
250 Notes to Chapter 3

Werbung einstellen,” Deutschland Nachrichten, 14 July 1995, 5; “Wie jedermann,” Der Spiegel,
10 July 1995, 108.
22. Although Benetton’s Web site includes some negative responses from consumers re-
garding its advertising, this is overshadowed by the overwhelmingly promotional content. See
United Colors of Benetton (Web site; available: http://www.benetton.com; 3 December 1996).
23. For information on Generation Y and clothing, see Sharon R. King, “Marketing
Fashion for the Gen Y Buyer,” New York Times, 28 August 1999 (online; available: http://www.
nytimes.com; 28 August 1999). Benetton’s agreement with Sears was terminated after Sears re-
ceived complaints on Benetton advertising using a death-row inmate in the United States.
24. See also Haacke’s installation Dyeing for Benetton (1994) (Haacke 1995, 228).
25. This is particularly the case with respect to clothing manufacturing. Labor policies of
corporations operating in Latin America were highlighted in the U.S. media when it became
known that a line of clothing promoted by television celebrity Kathie Lee Gifford (for
Walmart) was being manufactured by children working in inhumane conditions. Similar cases
(involving The Gap, Liz Claiborne, and the Walt Disney Company) were documented by the
National Labor Committee (NLC; a nonprofit labor and human rights advocacy group). As a
result, the NLC established agreements with The Gap and Gifford/Walmart in 1995 and 1996
to monitor corporate accountability. See National Labor Committee, “Executive Summary,”
10 November 1998 (online; available: http://www.nlcnet.org; 10 November 1998).
26. See Deborah Stead, “Corporations, Classrooms, and Commercialism: Some Say
Business Has Gone Too Far,” New York Times, Education Life Section 4A, 5 January 1997,
30–33, 41–47; Jacobson and Mazur 1995, 35.
27. This convergence between nonprofit, educational, and cultural institutions, on the
one hand, with commercial or corporate institutions, on the other, is illustrated by Disney,
which organizes one-week educational programs for high school students at its theme parks.
28. For a general overview of these developments with respect to identity, see Konrad H.
Jarausch, ed., Reconfiguring German Identities (Oxford: Berghahn Books, 1997).
29. See Giovanni Di Lorenzo, “Die intellektuelle Feuerwehr,” Der Spiegel, 8 February
1993, 210–11; München—Eine Stadt sagt nein: Die Lichterkette. Eine Dokumentation (Munich:
Süddeutsche Zeitung, 1992).
30. Within the publishing industry, there has been a significant interest in fiction and
nonfiction written by migrant authors in Germany. Migrantenliteratur is a well-established
market niche, particularly for smaller and medium-sized publishers.
31. Ursula Ott, “Gute Tat ist teuer,” Die Woche, 24 November 1995, 35.
32. See projects listed under “Social Sponsoring” in the ESB, http://www.esb-online.com.
33. With respect to the depiction of “foreigners,” especially Japanese, in U.S. advertise-
ments, see O’Barr 1994, 73–101, 157–98.
34. Advertisement for Mecklenburg–West Pomerania in Der Spiegel, 20 July 1998, 12.
35. For example, the court case over Binder Optik’s use of sunglasses and a parrot in an
advertisement stating its support for endangered species. See “Sponsoring-Urteil bestätigt:
Keine Werbung mit Artenschutz—Verfassungsbeschwerde möglich,” ESB, 17 February 1997,
(online; available: http://www.esb-online.com; 6 July 2001).
36. See Philip Morris Companies Incorporated Corporate Contribution Guidelines, 2–11.
37. Ibid., 13.
38. There was, however, one notable exception: Formula One auto racing. Without spon-
sorships from multinational corporations (more than $790 million a year) in the tobacco, au-
tomotive, oil, and consumer products industries (e.g., Philip Morris, Ford, Shell, Foster’s Beer,
and Benetton), designed to reach auto-racing fans (particularly younger males), experts be-
lieved Formula One would move to Asia and simply beam back racing with tobacco advertise-
 Notes to Chapter 4 251

ments over cable. The combination of corporate, media, and powerful consumer interest in
Formula One left this area of promotion untouched for an indefinite period of time. See Barry
Meier, “A Controversy on Tobacco Road: Do Smoking and Speed Mix?” New York Times, 4 De-
cember 1997; Edmund L. Andrews, “European Officials Agree To Ban on Most Tobacco Ads
by 2006,” New York Times, 5 December 1997.
39. Philip Morris Companies Inc., 1996 Annual Report (New York: Philip Morris Com-
panies, 1996), 4.
40. Philip Morris Companies Inc., 1997 Annual Report (New York: Philip Morris Com-
panies, 1997), 22–24.
41. See chapter 1, note 1.
42. Philip Morris Companies Inc., 1996 Annual Report, 4.
43. Philip Morris Companies Incorporated Corporate Contribution Guidelines, 10.
44. Information related to the sponsorship of the exhibition is taken from a Philip Morris
and Milwaukee Art Museum press release: “Milwaukee Art Museum Presents First Major
Exhibition of Latin American Women Artists. Sponsored by Philip Morris Companies Inc.
with additional support from the National Endowment for the Arts” (March 1995). The
“Sponsor Statement” is also included in the bilingual exhibition catalog (Biller 1995).
45. Philip Morris and MAM press release, 1; Biller 1995, 5.
46. Philip Morris and MAM press release, 2–3.
47. Ibid., 3.
48. In his preface to the catalog, MAM director Russell Bowman referred to the impor-
tance of mounting exhibitions that are culturally inclusive, that is, that also address women
and minorities and in this case the large percentage of people “with Latin American roots” in
the Chicago–Milwaukee–Green Bay corridor (Biller 1995, 4).
49. In manufacturing-based consumer-product businesses (e.g., those owned by Philip
Morris and its subsidiaries Kraft, Miller Brewing, and recently Nabisco), labor relations with
minority communities in urban centers can become a critical element in local corporate poli-
tics. See Lena Williams, “Companies Capitalizing on Worker Diversity,” New York Times, 15 De-
cember 1992; Taylor Cox Jr., Cultural Diversity in Organizations (San Francisco: Berrett-
Koehker, 1993). Under the category “Corporate Citizenship,” Philip Morris’s Annual Reports
refer to contributions to diversity, for example, through sponsorship of educational training, a
“diversity vendor program” that encourages purchases from businesses owned by women and
minorities, and human resources (i.e., personnel) policies “committed to diversity, in keeping
with our need to attract, retain and develop a workforce as diverse as the products we sell.” See
Philip Morris Companies Inc., 1995 Annual Report, 50.
50. Philip Morris and MAM press release, 4.
51. Curator Geraldine Biller refers parenthetically to the significance of the North
American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) but does not directly address the relationship be-
tween economic interests and their promotion via the vehicle of cultural exchange (1995, 19).
Through projects such as Latin American Women Artists, Biller hopes to overcome the hege-
monic discourses at the centers of economic power. Biller addresses the tension between the
mainstream and oppositional Latino art in situating her own role as curator and the status of
the MAM: “First, I am admittedly and unapologetically a gringa, organizing this exhibition for
a mainstream museum in the heartland of the United States” (1995, 19).

4. Sponsoring Lifestyle
1. This reference to the Civil War photographer Mathew Brady was also applied to an-
other leading celebrity photographer, Richard Avedon.
252 Notes to Chapter 4

2. In Europe, the exhibition premiered in Munich and subsequently traveled to Ham-

burg, Paris, Madrid, Edinburgh, and London. Throughout this chapter, I will distinguish be-
tween the “Portraits” advertisements and the Photographs exhibition and catalog. Some of the
photographs in the exhibitions and the catalog were also advertisements for The Gap or Ameri-
can Express. Most appeared originally in Rolling Stone or Vanity Fair. In any case, many of the
photographs functioned in multiple contexts, for example, as promotional magazine covers, as
advertisements, and as art photography at international exhibitions and in the catalog.
3. Celebrity and fashion photographer Richard Avedon experimented with appropriat-
ing the tabloid style of photography in some of his early work.
4. The original version read, “Bezahlen Sie einfach mit Ihrem guten Namen”; the final
version is rendered more direct by omitting the word “einfach” (“simply”): “Pay with your good
name.”
5. In this regard, we will also see that Leibovitz’s photographs function, at least tentative-
ly, to neutralize images of social hierarchy by demystifying the celebrity persona through visu-
al strategies of postmodern irony and self-parody (e.g., Pavarotti with a pitchfork).
6. See American Express advertising brochure on the exhibition Annie Leibovitz: Photo-
graphs, 1970–1990 at the MSM.
7. This voluminous report (approximately the size of a telephone book for a medium to
large city) includes print-media reports (copies of newspaper and magazine reviews, circula-
tion statistics) as well as synopses of electronic-media coverage (e.g., length of review or report,
television station or program, and number of viewers or listeners). Such studies provide evi-
dence that corporations involved in sponsorships are also very interested in measuring the im-
pact of sponsored programs, in terms of both public relations and product recognition—a fact
that American Express and most other corporations openly admit. By offering free admission
to the Photographs exhibitions to cardholders, American Express was also able to measure the
response to the free offer in its advertising among members (and indirectly assess the effective-
ness of the advertising). (In order to gain free admission, cardholders had to show their card;
an imprint was made of the card so that the actual number of cardholders visiting the exhibi-
tion was documented.) The documentation was “the result of thirty-four exclusive interviews
arranged for Annie Leibovitz, the press conference held on January 29th, 1992 (which was at-
tended by an impressive 172 reporters, photographers and film teams) as well as two press
mailings and intensive press work” (ABC/EUROCOM 1992, n.p.).
8. Marie Waldburg, “Warum Wim Wenders auf Annies Fotos steht,” Abendzeitung,
30 January 1992.
9. Claus Heinrich Meyer, “Es kommt Geld, es kommen Leute,” Süddeutsche Zeitung,
31 January 1992; “Von Geblitzten und Abgeblitzten,” Süddeutsche Zeitung, 30 January 1992.
10. Meyer’s “Es kommt Geld, es kommen Leute” was among the more critical.
11. The role of audiences at rock concerts represents a similar process, which combines per-
formance and reception. Members of the audience interact (singing, dancing, diving into the
audience) in a performance mode (i.e., for their own enjoyment and sensual gratification or
for the entertainment of other participants) and in a receptive mode (i.e., while listening and
viewing the on-stage performance). However, the celebrities who perform for the press at a
VIP event and the audiences who perform for each other at concerts accumulate very different
kinds of cultural capital. Celebrities acquire additional cultural capital through the mass-media
recognition, which can be transformed into economic capital. On the other hand, the audi-
ences who attend rock concerts, for example, derive primarily forms of self-gratification or en-
joyment and secondarily a degree of cultural capital based on the level of prestige, significance,
or distinction that they and their milieu associate with the attendance of that particular event,
 Notes to Chapter 4 253

that is, of “being there.” Unlike the celebrities, all of whose public appearances can be trans-
formed into media events that cumulatively yield economic capital, the “noncelebrity” audi-
ence cannot accumulate economic capital as either spectators or performers at events.
12. ABC/EUROCOM, Appendix 2.
13. American Express, “Portraits: Eine ungewöhnliche Anzeigen Kampagne” (Portraits:
An Unusual Advertising Campaign). Press release.
14. Harley-Davidson has opened its own museum at the factory in York, Pennsylvania,
and has registered more than 78,000 visitors each year.
15. The Art of the Motorcycle (online exhibition; available: http://www.guggenheim.org).
16. American Express, “American Express Targets United Kingdom’s Younger Market with
the Launch of Blue Card,” 23 May 1998 (online; available: http://www.americanexpress.com;
30 November 1998).
17. This was reported by Germany’s Federal Labor Office (Bundesanstalt für Arbeit) in
1993 and reported in an essay “Jeder Fünfte ein Künstler?” Süddeutsche Zeitung, 21 Febru-
ary 1993.
18. American Express press release, “Portraits,” 24 September 1992.
19. Ibid.
20. Ibid.
21. The photo of Hanna Schygulla as Maria Braun appeared on the front cover of the
German photography and trade magazine Fotodesign + Technik: Das creative Magazin für Foto-
design und die Technik moderner Bildaufzeichnungs- und Verarbeitungsverfahren, March 1992.
22. With regard to advertising’s recirculation of cultural images, see Wernick 1991, 25.
23. Leibovitz’s photograph of corporate consultant Gertrud Höhler is much more “typi-
cal” in this regard.
24. This form of self-parody may simply reinforce the “playful” quality of the celebrity
persona, that is, the quality of not taking oneself too seriously. Indeed, the staged quality of
most of Leibovitz’s photographs is one aspect of her aesthetics that she has mentioned in inter-
views (Sischy 1991/92, 10).
25. The cigarette as a symbol of commodification within the context of the Economic
Miracle and within U.S.-German economic and cultural transfer plays a significant role in sev-
eral key scenes in the movie, most notably in the following: (1) Maria Braun lights her ciga-
rette on the stove’s gas jet, which is left on and subsequently leads to the explosion in the final
scene of the film. (2) Maria’s husband, Hermann, returns unexpectedly after the war to find
Maria and Bill (an African American GI) in the bedroom; Hermann is distracted from Maria
and Bill when he sees a pack of cigarettes and rushes across the room to get one. (3) Maria
barters with her mother, exchanging a pack of cigarettes, which she had received from an
apologetic GI, for her mother’s broach.
26. Fassbinder and Wenders utilize American culture to thematize the cultural coloniza-
tion of Germany during the postwar era and to question the construction of a national identi-
ty vis-à-vis the United States. Wenders and the New German Filmmakers were self-consciously
aware of Germany’s turn to American culture because of its “profound mistrust of sounds and
images about itself ” (Morley and Robins 1995, 96; Silberman 1995, 214).
27. Leibovitz considers 1970 a particularly significant year in her career, as she began work
for Rolling Stone that year (Sischy 1991/92, 8).
28. Hutcheon writes, “His self-consciousness about the act of representing in both writ-
ing and photography undoes the mimetic assumptions of transparency that underpin the real-
ist project, while refusing as well the anti-representationalism of modernist and late modernist
abstraction and textuality. Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes manages to de-naturalize both the
254 Notes to Chapter 4

‘copying’ apparatus of photography and the realist reflecting mirror of narrative, while still ac-
knowledging—and exploiting—their shared power of inscription and construction” (1991, 41).
29. Leibovitz 1991/92, 51, 231n; see also Leibovitz 1991.
30. The theme “photographer as photographed” is repeated in Leibovitz’s photograph of
photographer Richard Avedon hiding behind a large studio camera (1976) (Leibovitz 1991/92,
104).
31. The photo of John Lennon taken shortly before his death has achieved cult status and
was used for the front cover of the Photographs catalog. Ingrid Sischy discusses the significance
of the body in Leibovitz’s work (in particular in the John Lennon and Yoko Ono photo)
(Sischy 1991/92, 9). See also the photo of Yoko Ono entitled Strawberry Fields, taken the fol-
lowing year, 1981 (Leibovitz 1991/92, 116–17).
32. Leibovitz completed a series of twenty female celebrity photos for a $52-million ad-
vertising campaign (for the National Fluid Milk Processor Promotion Board), including por-
traits of Lauren Bacall and supermodels Naomi Campbell and Christy Brinkley, each wearing
a white milk mustache. Dottie Enrico, “Celebrity Milk Mustaches,” USA Today, 10 January
1995; Schulberg 1998, xiv–xvi.
33. Swimming Dancers is the German title of the photo entitled Dancers (Leibovitz
1991/92, 231, 218–19).
34. Many of Leibovitz’s own comments on photography (e.g., documentary photography
as a construct) can be seen within the context of and have been informed by Susan Sontag’s
book On Photography (1989). See also McRobbie 1995, 77–95.
35. Douglas Kellner discusses Stallone in relationship to the reception of his Rambo char-
acter as a “polysemic cultural construct which can be appropriated by opposing sides in politi-
cal debate and struggle” (1995, 74).
36. However, in a later interview, Leibovitz also refers to the inherent tension in photo-
graphing these different subjects: “I can’t first shoot Arnold Schwarzenegger and then come back
and shoot the woman going through garbage” (quoted in Meyhöfer 1997, 17). Her heightened
consciousness of such contradictions in her own work is in part attributed to her friend and
collaborator Susan Sontag. Leibovitz has only begun to introduce such contradictions as a pro-
ductive force in her own recent projects.
37. Anja Schäfer, “Annie Leibovitz Exklusiv: Die Helden des Golfkriegs,” Männer Vogue,
February 1992.
38. Ibid.
39. The photos included H. Norman Schwarzkopf (commander of allied forces), Colin
Powell (chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff ), Javier Perez de Cuellar (U.N. secretary-general), Peter
Arnett (CNN news correspondent, Baghdad), Saud Nasir Al-Sabah (Kuwait’s ambassador to
the United States), a Stealth bomber, Major Joe Bouley (Stealth bomber pilot), Isaac Stern
(violinist), and Jacqueline Phillips Guibord (police officer in Utah, posed with a shotgun and
badge in the Leibovitz photo; an earlier photo of Guibord, not by Leibovitz, modeling
Wrangler jeans became a pinup for the U.S. troops in the Gulf ).
40. Schäfer, “Annie Leibovitz Exklusiv,” 127.
41. Ibid., 128.
42. Texts accompanying photographs are more common for Leibovitz’s photographs in
magazines (Vanity Fair, The New Yorker, Life) than for her work for advertising or art photog-
raphy appearing in catalogs or exhibitions. Leibovitz is certainly aware of the relations between
text and image in postmodern culture and references this in her own parody of postmodern
photography (in a photo of television monitors in an electronics store with photographer
Barbara Kruger appearing on multiple screens partially covered with sale signs) (Leibovitz
1991/92, 211; on text and image, see McRobbie 1995, 91).
 Notes to Chapter 5 255

43. The places (e.g., the Berlin Wall, or Baghdad Hotel’s swimming pool) offer a guide-
post for visual orientation as well as a more elaborate range of symbolic associations. With re-
gard to the relationship between symbol and index, see Gottdiener 1995, 67–68, 71.
44. This aspect of Arnett’s interview with Saddam Hussein was debated in the U.S. media.
45. The New Yorker, 29 January 1996, 69–77.
46. Deborah Scaperoth, “Looks Are Deceiving,” letter to the editor, The New Yorker,
18 March 1996, 2.
47. The information in this section is based on Bill Goldstein’s interview with Leibovitz
on an extensive Web site at the New York Times online edition, established to promote the
book (online; available: http://www.nytimes.com/library/photos/leibovitz/interview.html;
9 September 2000). In the interview, Leibovitz comments on the pivotal role of the “Show-
girls” series, which she developed toward the end of the Women book project.

5. Sponsoring Events
1. The project, which was formally called Wrapped Reichstag, Berlin, 1971–95, was devel-
oped by Christo and Jeanne-Claude. References to Christo do not imply the exclusion of
Jeanne-Claude from the project. In certain cases, they may refer to a quote by Christo alone.
2. Here Tschumi refers to John Rajchman’s work on Foucault; Tschumi 1994, 256.
3. Hal Espen writes, “To be sure, this widespread misapprehension that Woodstock was
anticommercial rather than unsuccessfully commercial has, paradoxically, become one of the
most appealing, and salable, aspects of the Woodstock mystique” (1994, 73); on the signifi-
cance of the film Woodstock within the context of the 1960s, see Kellner 1995, 104–6.
4. However, they have accepted forms of sponsorship or patronage for some smaller
projects. See Gabi Szöppan, “Journal: Christo,” Kritik 2 (1995): 2.
5. Benjamin referred to the aesthetic qualities of film as a new medium; however, post-
modern film raises the possibility of employing commodified images of “shock” (e.g., stock
scenes from the horror genre, violence, brutality) in order to destabilize these genres.
6. There is extensive literature on the event. Some of the more influential discussions
include Daniel Boorstin, The Image; or, What Happened to the American Dream (London:
Weidenfeld and Nicholson, 1961). (Wernick points out that Boorstin’s analysis of pseudo-
events and the importance of the image predates Jean Baudrillard’s work, which has received
much wider reception; Wernick 1991, 185–88.) See Debord 1995; Laura Mulvey, “Visual Plea-
sure and Narrative Cinema,” in Popular Television and Film, ed. Tony Bennett (London:
BFI, 1981), 206–15. The journal Theory and Event explores political thought and contempo-
rary events.
7. Texaco Press Information, “Behind the Scenes with Texaco and the Met,” 30 No-
vember 1998 (online; available: http://www.texaco.com).
8. Schulze notes that the significance of the body in the process of experiencing has been
relegated to “lower” forms of enjoyment in sociological research or analyzed primarily in terms
of cognition and communication, for example, by Pierre Bourdieu and Umberto Eco (Schulze
1992, 106). Schulze’s analysis provides additional qualitative and quantitative sociological evi-
dence with respect to the signification of the body as a site of constructing identity and experi-
ence, evidence that augments extensive research within cultural and feminist studies.
9. Perhaps one of the most visible events of what was once considered to be a signifier of
high culture is the opera festival. Bayreuth is associated with European society and culture in
the grand tradition of the nineteenth century. Yet as Marc Weiner observed, adaptations and
televised performances of Wagner’s Ring (including those of other venues, such as the Metro-
politan Opera in New York) have reached more demographically diverse audiences. Adaptations
256 Notes to Chapter 5

and their subsequent reception, at least tentatively, challenged the representation of cultur-
al and ethnic identities. See Marc Weiner, Richard Wagner and the Anti-Semitic Imagination
(Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1995), 17.
10. Conductor and festival director Justus Frantz, Carl Hermann Schleifer (then secretary
of finance for the State of Schleswig-Holstein), and businessman Ulrich Urban were the driv-
ing forces behind the conceptual development of the festival, reflecting the “new partnerships”
between culture, politics, and commerce.
11. See Frank-Olaf Brauerhoch’s discussion of the professionalization of street-fair and
festival culture in various districts of Frankfurt. As part of the city’s cultural politics, these
events were designed, in part, to include “foreign” residents of the city; however, this participa-
tion situated them as spectators for the established groups that dominated the events
(Brauerhoch 1993, 113–15).
12. Willnauer had been opposed to the “Schleswig-Holstein model” while he was in
Salzburg. Now he was being brought in to tighten the management. Werner Burkhardt,
“Wolken sind überall,” Süddeutsche Zeitung, 27 June 1995.
13. See Bregenzer Festspiele Web site: http://www.bregenzerfestspiele.com; 9 Septem-
ber 2001.
14. With respect to the relationship between the dramaturgical special effects in Bregenz
and Pountney’s direction, see Thomas Thieringer, “Nabucco im Käfig,” Süddeutsche Zeitung,
23 July 1993.
15. Thieringer, in “Nabucco im Käfig,” notes that when Austria’s president, Thomas
Klestil, for example, appeared in Bregenz, there was no public applause. The response was con-
sidered a result of the negative image of the office after revelations of Kurt Waldheim’s activi-
ties during National Socialism.
16. This is based on an American Express advertisement in the Süddeutsche Zeitung, 10
September 1992. Of course, American Express also offered its customary VIP packages to ac-
company the event for cardholders, as well as “cultural tourism” packages.
17. Peter Buchka, “Benutzen statt gucken: Die neue Sommerattraktion. Open-air-Kino,”
Süddeutsche Zeitung, 26 July 1995.
18. Ibid.
19. Roger Thiede and Stefan Wimmer, “Die 89er: Eine umkämpfte Generation,” Focus 28
(1995): 134; Henkel and Wolff 1996, 102–9.
20. The performative aspect of dance culture is taken out of the clubs into the street and
back again.
21. For an extensive discussion of the intersection of fashion, youth subculture, and the
media (including digital “wearables”), see Birgit Richard, “Die oberflächlichen Hüllen des
Selbst: Mode als ästhetisch-medialer Komplex,” Kunstforum 141 (1998): 49–93; Tracy Skelton
and Gill Valentine, Cool Places: Geographies of Youth Cultures (London: Routledge, 1997). An
archive of fashion dealing with rave, techno, and house within youth culture is located at the
Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität Frankfurt’s Institut für Kunstpädagogik, directed by
Birgit Richard. Information on the research and artifacts can be accessed online at http://
www.uni-frankfurt.de/f609/kunstpaed/indexweb/jka.htm; 9 September 2001.
22. “Tanzen für den Frieden,” Der Spiegel, 3 July 1995, 103.
23. “Vergeßt alle Systeme,” Der Spiegel, 14 August 1995, 154–60.
24. Regarding Generation Y, the successor to Generation X, as consumer group, see
Sharon R. King, “Marketing Fashion for the Gen Y Buyer,” New York Times, 28 August 1999
(online; available: http://www.nytimes.com).
25. This strategy of creating “sensational” or “bad” publicity (e.g., for the tabloids) that
 Notes to Chapter 5 257

will arouse moral indignation among some and titillation among others was probably perfect-
ed by Hollywood.
26. Grossberg develops Will Straw’s definitions of scenes with respect to music and dance
(Grossberg 1994, 46, 58n10).
27. Weinberg emphasizes the concept of “youthfulness” as an appealing orientation that
cuts across social milieus and is employed in marketing experiences (1992, 21).
28. Philip Morris, “Light American Minister,” advertisement, 1992.
29. For obvious reasons, sponsors refrain from addressing volatile or violent youth sub-
cultures (e.g., skinheads, neo-Nazis) unless the styles of a particular subculture are adapted by
other subcultures that are considered socially legitimate (e.g., punk fashion). See Ilka Piepgras,
“Kundschafter der Nacht: Weil Marketing-Experten die Jugend kaum noch verstehen, schicken
sie Spione in die Partyszene,” Berliner Zeitung, 13 September 1995.
30. Piepgras, “Kundschafter der Nacht.”
31. Schulze refers to four main strategies utilized by the commercial and nonprofit insti-
tutions of cultural production: schematization, the production of distinctive images or pro-
files, variation, and suggestion (1992, 425).
32. See Gottdiener’s discussion of the signification of punk (1995, 243–52).
33. Kellner points out that much of the image of the original Woodstock had been re-
duced to style through its promotion in movies such as Woodstock and Easy Rider (1995,
104–6). One must question to what extent Woodstock ’94 adapted and modified these vestiges
of Woodstock style in retro fashion, that is, in dress and music.
34. Kevin Goldman, “Woodstock ’94 Signs Up Pepsi, Häagen-Dazs, and the Wiz,” Wall
Street Journal, 21 June 1994.
35. The notion of rock classics was most visibly institutionalized through the Rock and
Roll Hall of Fame and Museum, originally conceived in 1983 in New York and opened in 1994
as a museum complex in Cleveland. The museum documents and promotes popular music.
36. Jeff Rowlands, senior vice president, PolyGram Diversified Ventures, coproducer of
Woodstock ’94, “Ravestock at Woodstock,” 18 July 1996 (online; available: http://www.
Woodstock-94.com; 18 July 1996).
37. Scotto/DEA, “Ravestock at Woodstock.”
38. With respect to product placement at rock concerts and in video clips, see Kohlen-
berg 1994, 45–47; Rau 1994, 243–53.
39. “Woodstock ’94 Unveils the Surreal Field,” 18 July 1996 (online; available: http://
www.Woodstock-94.com; 18 July 1996).
40. For example, the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota, which includes the
theme park Camp Snoopy as well as multiple entertainment venues such as Planet Hollywood.
41. Patrica Leigh Brown, “Step Right Up: Let an Architect Thrill You,” New York Times,
19 February 1998.
42. See also syndicated columns appearing in regional newspapers; for example, see Neal
Karlen, “Festival Wasn’t a Revolution, It Was a Marketing Key,” Des Moines Register, 11 August
1994 (New York Times syndication); Frank Rich, “Woodstock ’94: Made for the Age of
Overkill,” Des Moines Register, 18 July 1994 (New York Times syndication).
43. To what extent the violence at Woodstock ’99 resulted from the event’s commerciali-
zation is of course difficult to ascertain, particularly given more-widespread violence (rioting)
at many public venues (including college campuses) during the 1980s and 1990s. Regarding
violence during the summer of 1999, see Jenny Eliscu, “Riots Erupt at Dave Matthews Band
Shows,” Rolling Stone, 16 September 1999, 41. In any case, the relations among youth sub-
cultures, events, and violence warrant further investigation. Most of the research in this area
258 Notes to Chapter 5

currently focuses on media (e.g., video and television) rather than event culture. (See also
chapter 7 regarding video games and violence.)
44. I am not referring here to events organized by political parties, labor unions, or other
sociopolitical organizations.
45. As of this writing, Live Aid (raised $56 million) and Farm Aid ($15 million) have been
the most financially successful events. There are also a number of ongoing concert events that
raise money on an annual basis (e.g., Tibetan Freedom Concerts). Mega-events are also in-
creasingly disseminated on the Internet. For example, NetAid—Webcast from Giants Stadi-
um, New Jersey; Wembley Stadium, London; and the Opera House, Geneva—was sponsored
by the data communications firm Cisco Systems and the consulting firm KPMG in 1999 as
part of the United Nations Development Programme to fight poverty.
46. The activities of SiN and SMF are reported in Josefine Köhn, “Ein Funke ist überge-
sprungen,” Süddeutsche Zeitung, 11 December 1998.
47. With respect to the representation of Berlin, see Klaus Hartung, “So viel Übergang
war nie,” Die Zeit, 16 June 1995.
48. This strategy is similar to Haacke’s work (Bourdieu and Haacke 1995, 95).
49. For a detailed chronology of the project, see Michael S. Cullen: “Chronologie des
Reichstag-Projekts (1971–1993)” (Baal-Teshuva 1993, 30–40).
50. See the documentation of speeches in Baal-Teshuva 1993, 40ff. For a cross-section of
cultural commentary in the press, see Werner Spies, “Meister der Vergänglichkeit,” Frank-
furter Allgemeine Zeitung, 23 December 1993; Petra Kipphoff, “Die Politik kann einpacken,”
Die Zeit, 18 February 1994; Frank Schirrmacher, “Den Reichstag verpacken?” Frankfurter
Allgemeine Zeitung, 23 February 1994.
51. Here, see Andreas Huyssen, “Monumental Seduction,” New German Critique 69
(1996): 187; Huyssen 1995, 249–60. The debate over the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin and
over Cultural Minister Michael Naumann’s reappraisal of the Kohl government’s plans for it
assumed a significant position in postunification cultural politics.
52. Christo and Jeanne-Claude have financed approximated $130 million for their proj-
ects through similar sales of project-related artwork. See Jutta Lehmer, “Die Kunst der
Finanzierung,” Berliner Zeitung, 1 July 1995 (online; available: http://www.berlinonline.de; 1
July 1995).
53. Prominent government politicians (e.g., Rita Süssmuth, president of the Bundestag)
did appear in an information tent next to the Reichstag to meet with the public. See “Politiker
plädieren für Verlängerung,” Berliner Zeitung, 29 June 1995 (online; available: http://www.
berlinonline.de; 1 July 1995). In May 1995, Stern magazine attempted to place one of four
diorama pavilions on panoramas of “Berlin 2005” within the excluded line of sight of the
Wrapped Reichstag; however, the “rotunda” was moved to another location subsequent to
a court order. Teja Fiedler, “Jetzt fürchten sie nur noch den Wind,” Stern (25) 1995: 166;
“Chronik einer Staatsaktion,” Berliner Zeitung, 1 July 1995 (online; available: http://www.
berlinonline.de; 1 July 1995).
54. “Politiker plädieren für Verlängerung.”
55. “Kultur, Kommerz, und Außenpolitik: Ungewohnte Perspektiven, neue Kooperation-
en,” symposium sponsored by the Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels, Frankfurt/M.,
15 January 1996.
56. Jürgen Habermas, “Modernity versus Postmodernity,” New German Critique 22 (1981):
12 (cited in Enssle and Macdonald 1997, 16, 21n47).
57. Schulze points to forms of suggestion and autosuggestion as strategies of organizing
and structuring experiences (and the relations between products and their images) both for
producers and the consumers of experiences (1992, 436, 443).
 Notes to Chapter 6 259

6. The Sponsored Museum; or, The Museum as Sponsor

1. As of this writing, plans are underway for another Guggenheim in New York City, to
be designed by Frank Gehry. Also MASS MOCA, a former warehouse transformed into a mu-
seum space for contemporary art (conceived by Thomas Krens before he assumed directorship
of the Guggenheim), will display works from the Guggenheim collections. See Martin Filler,
“The Museum Game,” The New Yorker, 17 April 2000, 97–105. In a postmodern gesture of
self-referentiality, the Guggenheim (New York) presented an exhibition entitled The Global
Guggenheim: Selections from the Extended Collection (2001).
2. See Eva Larrauri, “El Museo Guggenheim de Bilbao desvela el contenido de su colec-
ción permanente,” El Pais, 4 October 1997 (online; available: http://www.elpais.es; 4 October
1997).
3. See Filler, “The Museum Game,” regarding these plans. Regarding the initial success
of the GMB, see also http://www.guggenheim-bilbao.es/ingles/historia/contenido.htm.
4. For a discussion of the “Guggenheim phenomenon” from the perspective of museum
directors, corporate leaders, and cultural mediators in Germany, see Hoffmann 1999.
5. See Guggenheim Museum, “Museum History,” 20 January 1999 (online; available:
http://www.guggenheim.org/berlin/history/his_main_info.html; also see www.deutsche-
guggenheim-berlin.de/info/index.htm; 20 January 1999).
6. For discussion of the historical status of Unter den Linden, see Laurenz Demps, “Das
Zentrum: Unter den Linden, Wilhelmstraße, Gendarmenmarkt,” in Berlin: Eine Orts-
besichtigung. Kultur—Geschichte—Architektur (Berlin: Transit, 1996).
7. According to Ulf Brychcy, the banks and hotels have asked police to patrol the Pariser
Platz for street vendors or other unwanted “visitors” who might disturb the upscale guests who
frequent the Adlon or the Dresdner Bank. As Berlin’s “front parlor” (Gute Stube), designed to
show off the city center, the Pariser Platz is increasingly reserved for special events (e.g., film
festivals). See Ulf Brychcy, “Gute Stube: Verschlossen. Am Pariser Platz empfängt die Stadt
ihre Gäste—nur die willkommenen natürlich,” Süddeutsche Zeitung, 22 July 1998.
8. Guggenheim Museum Web site (online; available: http://www.deutsche-guggenheim-
berlin.de; 31 July 2001).
9. See Guggenheim’s “Web Partners” (online; available: http://www.guggenheim.org).
10. See Guggenheim Museum Web site (online; available: http://www.guggenheim.org).
Matthew Barney is known for his videos, installations, and performances, particularly those
that deal with the body, medicine, and sports. His cycle of movies (Cremaster) was widely re-
viewed in the international art scene, and the Guggenheim planned a major retrospective of
the series for 2001. See Christian Kämmerling, “‘Mein Kopf ist wie ein Cockpit,’” Süddeutsche
Zeitung Magazin, 13 November 1998, 34–40.
11. See the promotional brochure “Willkommen bei uns in Wolfsburg,” VW AG Public
Relations. “Kraft-durch-Freude” was a designation for National Socialist mass organizations.
12. Under National Socialism, Volkswagen, much like other state-run industries, relied
on non-German prisoners and forced laborers to power the war machine.
13. VW Press Information, “Wolfsburg auf dem Weg zur Urbanität.”
14. Deutschland Nachrichten, 27 May 1994, 7.
15. Jürgen Schow was chief legal counsel for VW AG at the time the Kunststiftung
Volkswagen was established (Schow 1994, 104–5).
16. Wolfgang Guthardt, director of cultural affairs of the City of Wolfsburg, Italienischer
Sommer in Wolfsburg, brochure.
17. The closest the official program came to engaging Italians who lived and worked in
Wolfsburg was a small photography exhibit portraying everyday life at the German-Italian ele-
mentary school in Wolfsburg (Italienischer Sommer in Wolfsburg).
260 Notes to Chapter 6

18. “Let’s Spend the Night Together: Volkswagen und die Rolling Stones,” interview with
Jennifer Hurshell, Indigo Stadtmagazin, July/August 1995, 12–13.
19. See “Let’s Spend the Night Together,” 13.
20. Anne Mikus identifies 169 corporate museums in Germany (1997, 211).
21. See the museum brochure Erlebniswelt BMW Museum—The BMW Museum Ex-
perience, BMW Museum.
22. Ibid., 15.
23. Bill Munn, “It’s More Than a Trip down Memory Lane,” AUTO Magazine, Novem-
ber 1994, 23–25, here 24–25; see also BMW AG München, “Zeithorizont: Eine Führung durch
das BMW Museum,” September 1993; Horst Mönnich, BMW: Eine deutsche Geschichte
(Munich: Piper, 1991).
24. Recognizing that its AutoMuseum was rather obsolete, in 2000 Volkswagen opened a
new $420-million high-tech theme park, Autostadt, including a luxury hotel and attractions.
Autostadt can also be seen within the broader context of Wolfsburg’s attempts to position itself
as a regional center of tourism. This also includes the new Science Center designed by the
internationally acclaimed architect Zaha Hadid. See “Zaha Hadid gewinnt Wettbewerb
in Wolftsburg,” Frankfurter Rundschau, 17 February 2000 (online; available: http://www.
fr-aktuel.de; 17 February 2000); Steven Komarow, “VW Park Pampers Buyers,” USA Today,
11 July 2000.
25. BMW’s later development of its own section for cultural programs (Kulturreferat)
confirmed the significance of participating in cultural politics at the regional, national, and
international levels (see chapter 2).
26. Erlebniswelt BMW Museum, 4.
27. BMW AG Presse, “BMW Museum: Zeithorizont,” no. 4 (1991): 6.
28. Ibid., 20–23.
29. BMW AG Presse, “BMW Isetta: Die Knutschkugel wird 40,” 1995: 2–4.
30. The Grand Prix for children (sponsored by the Rosso Bianco Collection of sports cars
in Aschaffenburg) was integrated into social sponsorships for educating children on traffic
safety (supported by the Automobile Club of Germany) and encouraged them to gather dona-
tions in automobile-shaped containers for MUKO (Mukoviszidose-Hilfe). See BMW AG
Presse, “Isetta: Kinder-Grand-Prix,” 1995: 2.
31. BMW AG Presse, “BMW Isetta: Zeitzeuge der 50er Jahre,” 1995.
32. While such programs might be considered part of administrative globalization, in the
case of Vitra they do not seem to involve attempts to promote the corporation’s own products
or interests; rather, they are based on design and Vitra’s own strategies of alternative modes of
curatorial development, which are not reduced to product mediation.
33. See Guggenheim Web site (online; available: http://www.guggenheim.org/motorcycl/
1993-1998.html). For information on how Thomas Krens expanded the mission of the Gug-
genheim, see Carol Lutfy, “China Comes to the Guggenheim,” ARTnews, March 1998, 144–45.
34. Alice Rawsthorn, “Museum or Amusement Park?” Travel and Leisure, October 2000,
147–52.
35. See Henryk M. Broder, “Kirche ohne Fenster,” Der Spiegel, 7 August 2000, 164–69.
36. McKinsey has examined the function of museums as cultural mediators (e.g., at the
Stuttgart Staatsgalerie). See Christian Marquart, “Der Kundige ist König,” Süddeutsche
Zeitung, 21 July 1998.
37. Both theorists recognize that there are, of course, significant structural and functional
differences between museums and mass media and also are conscious of the role of electronic
media in museums. Silverstone 1994, 175n7; Huyssen 1995, 32.
 Notes to Chapter 7 261

38. Projects developed by artists Clegg and Guttmann within corporate and public spaces
provide some tentative possibilities in this direction (see chapter 2).

7. Cybersponsoring
1. Howard Rheingold, referring to William Gibson, defines cyberspace as “the name
some people use for the conceptual space where words, human relationships, data, wealth, and
power are manifested by people using CMC [computer-mediated communications] technolo-
gy” (1994, 5).
2. Here it is important to distinguish between three basic forms of production or media-
tion: (1) the digitization of existing works or collections for distribution on CD-ROM or on-
line; (2) media-art installations in museums (e.g., art utilizing video, computer, or virtual reali-
ty technologies); and (3) online projects developed specifically for the World Wide Web or
Internet (Atkins 1999, 89).
3. There are also new centers emerging, such as Museum 540 (New York) and the
Beecher Center for the Electronic Arts (Youngstown, Ohio). Museum 540 is attempting to de-
velop media programs without the commercial interests driving much of the new technology.
See Matthew Mirapaul, “Groundbreaking Developments in Electronic Art,” New York Times,
24 December 1998 (online; available: http://www.nytimes.com; 24 December 1998).
4. Ars Electronica Center, 9 January 1999 (online; available: http://www.aec.at; 9 Janu-
ary 1999).
5. Ibid.
6. The promotion of “educational outreach” has become a particularly important ele-
ment in validating the democratization of the museum and in maintaining institutional legiti-
macy. In this respect, science and technology museums and specialized programming by enter-
tainment and media corporations play an important role in the process of representing the
relations of technology and society and constructing narratives for education and technology.
With regard to themed environments and Disney’s pedagogies and corporate politics, see
Henry A. Giroux, The Mouse That Roared: Disney and the End of Innocence (Lanham, Md.:
Rowman & Littlefield, 1999).
7. The following statement from the AEC Web site is indicative of the center’s role in
promoting corporate interests: “As a permanent studio for innovation, it is a competent part-
ner with professional know-how. In cooperation with corporate industries like Voest Alpine
MCE, the development of new simulation methods, training, or product presentation are
given particular importance. Wolfgang Modera, Managing Director, sees the considerable in-
terest of industry to be predicated on the notion that artistic consideration of technology with-
in the AEC releases a potential which is frequently hidden within the ‘standardized’ regime of
technology. And it is precisely as a result of this fact that many technicians and engineers have
received valuable innovations for their companies as a result of the ‘open character’ of the Ars
Electronica Center” (AEC Web site [online; available: http://www.aec.at]).
8. Each corporate page at the AEC includes a promotional statement defining and legiti-
mizing the corporate role in technology, culture, and the AEC; a corporate profile; and a sum-
mary of corporate technologies and services. Technology corporations represent the majority
of sponsors: Hewlitt-Packard Austria, Digital Equipment Austria, Gericom, Siemens Nixdorf
Austria, Silicon Graphics, Ericcson, and Oracle. Hewlitt-Packard provides the AEC video
server, video-on-demand in the media center, and printers for the administrative offices.
Oracle supplies software for AEC information and administrative systems. In addition to
sponsoring the Prix Ars Electronica, Siemens Nixdorf donates hardware for ticketing systems
and information-management systems for data searches. Ericcson installed an in-house
262 Notes to Chapter 7

asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) network for digital information transmission. The
Sky–Media Loft virtual reality installation uses Gericom notebook computers. And in the
foyer of the AEC, the Pro Cash Installation sponsored by the Creditanstalt presents an inter-
active electronic currency market.
9. Given the title of the festival, its siting in Linz is also somewhat ironic. Linz was to be
Hitler’s metropolis of the future for National Socialism.
10. Arthur and Marilouise Kroker, “Digital Ideology: E-Theory (1),” review of Business @
The Speed of Thought: Using a Digital Nervous System, by Bill Gates, CTHEORY, 1999 (online;
available: http://www.ctheory.com; 9 September 2001), 5.
11. Although museums employ notions of modernity, their actual practices reflect post-
modern culture, that is, cultural and sociological de-differentiation (Lash 1991). Indeed, much
of media art itself is a postmodern phenomenon. Institutionally, the centers for art and tech-
nology, as meta-museums, blur and de-differentiate the modernist conception of the museum
(e.g., representation and filtering of high culture). The museum as an experimental studio for
artistic production and events, as well as a site for entertainment, is a distinctive feature of this
process.
12. Museums are encouraged to use the aesthetics of games for their interactive CD-
ROMs. See Lee Rosenbaum, “Art Lovers Cool to Lures of CD-ROM’s,” New York Times,
23 July 1998 (online; available: http://www.nytimes.com; 23 July 1998).
13. For references to DOOM in the U.S. media, see, among others, Timothy Egan, “The
Trouble with Looking for Signs of Trouble,” New York Times, 25 April 1999 (online; available:
http://www.nytimes.com). The pedagogical basis of Schindler’s installation at the ZKM in
Karlsruhe may be found in Friedemann Schindler and Jens Wiemken, “DOOM Is Invading
My Dreams: Warum ein Gewaltspiel Kultstatus erlangte,” in Handbuch Medien: Computer-
spiele Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung, ed. J. Fritz and W. Fehr, 1997 (online; available:
http://salon-digital.zkm.de/~snp/referate/doom.htm; 5 May 1999).
14. The ZKM attempts to examine media art within the broader contexts and histories of
technological development, providing a certain structure to exhibitions, without, however, in-
voking “fictional, linear histories of technology” (Schwarz 1997, 32). Schwarz relates this aspect
to the need for museums to develop installations, displays, and presentations that are appro-
priate to media art (1997, 13, 29).
15. George MacDonald and Stephen Alsford use the term “meta-museum” primarily in
reference to digitization projects rather than to the formation of new museum concepts inte-
grating projects for art and technology (1997, 272–73).
16. These include cooperative agreements with other centers or museums, such as the
ZKM’s collaboration with the Guggenheim’s Virtual Museum project.
17. For example, visitors using the chip cards at the “Log-In Gateway” at the AEC.
18. In many respects, the new media centers combining museums under one conceptual
roof are not radically different from mega-museums, like the Metropolitan Museum of Art or
the Louvre, that house their own departments and collections extensive enough to form a mu-
seum within a museum. Although the new museum centers claim to serve similar functions
(documentation, archiving, representation, and exhibition), what distinguishes them from the
Met or the Louvre is their emphasis on the museum as a site of cultural production (e.g., artist
studios and labs) as well as of mediation and reception.
19. A variety of nonprofit organizations and consortia—such as the Art Museum Image
Consortium (AMICO), the Museum Informatics Project (MIP) at the University of Cali-
fornia, Berkeley, or the Museum Educational Site Licensing Project (MESL) (supported in
part by the Getty Information Institute)—developed technical and administrative support for
 Notes to Chapter 7 263

the digitization and dissemination of collections and archives. More than any other factor, col-
lection digitization and online dissemination promise to reconfigure contemporary museum
practices.
20. Some curators have argued that using media and the World Wide Web for historical
reconstruction of cultures can potentially “redress somewhat . . . [the] colonialist and migrato-
ry trends over the last two centuries result[ing] in the fragmentation and even annihilation of
many of the world’s cultures, a process from which museums have been among the beneficiar-
ies” (MacDonald and Alsford 1997, 274). Yet this argument once again positions the museum
as a patron that grants access to privileged culture to those from whom it has been taken—
creating new barriers to access through capital investment in technology—rather than uncov-
ering and interrogating the relations between the objects of museal representation and the
function of the museum itself.
21. There are also significant costs associated with some new technologies, such as the
higher bandwith required for high-resolution, full-motion video, which may make it difficult
for smaller organizations to gain access to technology (Sherwood 1997, 141).
22. Matthew Mirapaul, “Columbia, Guggenheim, and BAM Consider New Media-Arts
Program,” New York Times, 12 August 1999 (online; available: http://www.nytimes.com; 12 Au-
gust 1999).
23. Quoted in Mark Tribe, “Burning under the Fingernails: Interview with Gerfried
Stocker,” Rhizome, 7 September 1999 (online; available: http://www.rhizome.org; 7 September
1999).
24. With regard to the origins of the Internet in ARPANET (the U.S. Defense De-
partment’s Advanced Research Projects Agency Network), Rheingold writes, “The fundamen-
tal technical idea on which ARPANET was based came from RAND, the think tank in Santa
Monica that did a lot of work with top-secret thermonuclear war scenarios; ARPANET grew
out of an older RAND scheme for a communication, command, and control network that
could survive nuclear attack by having no central control” (1994, 7).
25. See the BRANDON Project at the Guggenheim Web site: http://www.brandon.
guggenheim.org; 20 September 1998.
26. Ibid.
27. See Jennifer Terry’s remarks as a participant in a panel discussion on BRANDON:
Guggenheim Museum Soho, 20 September 1998 (online; available: http://www.brandon.
guggenheim.org; 20 September 1998).
28. Text composed by Fiona McGregor for BRANDON road-trip interface (online;
available: http://www.brandon.guggenheim.org).
29. The intersection of the spectacle, of the sensational, with sexuality, violence, and gen-
der identity are further thematized in the introductory “bigdoll” interface.
30. Terry’s commentary on BRANDON.
31. A number of other media dealt with the history and reception of BRANDON both
prior to and following Cheang’s project. Although these treatments have led to a greater
awareness of transgender issues, they also (inevitably) involved some degree of sensationalism
and promotion, ranging, for example, from the novelization (All S/he Wanted), to television
documentaries (Investigative Reports), to the Jerry Springer Show (at the most extreme); see, for
example, GLAAD Alert, “Two Thumbs Up: Roger Ebert Talks about Drag,” 24 September
1998 (online; available: http://glaad.org; 24 September 1998). Following an internationally ac-
claimed documentary, The Brandon Teena Story (1998) by Susan Muska and Greta Olafsdottir,
Kimberly Peirce’s film on Brandon, Boys Don’t Cry (1999), received overwhelmingly positive
reviews from the mainstream and queer media, as well as several Oscars in 2000. However,
264 Notes to Chapter 7

entertainment media (e.g., Premiere movie magazine) reconfigured the image of Brandon as a
cult celebrity through its promotional framing of actress Hilary Swank (who played the role of
Brandon). See Robert Abele, “Hilary Swank: The Actress Breaks Out with a Dramatic Turn as
a Gender-Bending Teen,” Premiere, November 1999, 46.
32. With respect to new roles of media artists as curators, see Aurora Lovelock, “Curating
on the Edge of Chaos, Curating the Net,” Cached 5, ICA London, 23 June 1998 (online; avail-
able: http://www.rhizome.org).
33. Ford Motor Company, Ford Fund annual report (online; available: http://www.
ford.com/; 10 May 1998).
34. Ibid. One of the most visible forms of social sponsorships used for corporate product
promotion throughout the 1980s and 1990s was donations of computers and hardware to
schools, universities, and other institutions.
35. Susan Kong, “Q&A: Jane Mayer. Distributing Grants to Nonprofit Groups,” New York
Times, Long Island Weekly Desk, 3 May 1998 (online; available: http://www.nytimes.com).
36. Rachel Baker discusses the “Cyberhostess” currently available at the WWW.PDFtm
(Wood 1998, 206–11). With regard to the “Corporate Virtual Workspace,” Steve Pruitt and
Tom Barrett predict, “No longer limited to statistical studies or contrived product prototype
trials, a company will maintain a real-time data base of customer demands as they try out and
respond to specific products” (1992, 405–6).
37. Small and medium-sized corporations are also becoming more involved in sponsor-
ships as forms of technology and culture merge.
38. This has become increasingly true in Germany as well as in the United States (Schulze
1992, 528–29).
39. NEA reports that 100 percent of LAAs “in the 50 largest U.S. cities use the arts to ad-
dress community development issues, an increase from 88 percent in 1994 and approximately
20 percent in 1986” (Larson 1997, 84–86).
40. With respect to the textile industry, see the activities of the NLC (discussed in chapter
3) at http://www.nlcnet.org.
41. Although Philippe de Montebello actually became the Met’s chief executive while re-
maining director, technically speaking, he had been subordinate to the former chief executive
William H. Luers. David E. McKinney of IBM assumed the position of president. See Judith
Dobrzynski, “A Diplomatic Look back at a Met Career,” New York Times, 7 January 1999.
42. Henning Klüver, “Don Giovanni trägt Armani,” Süddeutsche Zeitung, 9 December
1998.
43. Christoph Wiedemann, “Zwischen Party-Dekoration und Wertschöpfung,” Süd-
deutsche Zeitung, 27 January 1999.
44. Judith Miller, “Bleak Study on the Arts Brings Outcry,” New York Times, 20 October
1997.
45. Universities in the United States provide one example of wealthy donors’ and corpo-
rate interests’ considerable influence in shifting programmatic emphases by establishing new
institutes and programs and by providing infrastructure for them through building projects.
With respect to research and technology, see Norman E. Bowie, University-Business Partner-
ships (Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield, 1994).
46. Of the $9 billion per annum in arts contributions, approximately $1 billion comes
from corporations. This does not include corporate marketing budgets for sponsorships
(Business Committee for the Arts 1998, 4, 15). Nor do these numbers include the dollar value
of individual contributions based on the type of organization. I have argued that despite the
relatively low proportion of corporate contributions among total contributions, corporate par-
 Notes to Chapter 7 265

ticipation nevertheless has a significant effect, not only because it is strategically deployed
within promotional campaigns that have a broader multiple effect and can also support certain
types of programs, but also because individuals seldom pool their capital resources. Even
among those corporations that consider their support to cultural sponsorships to be “non-
commercial,” the majority integrate their donations into business strategies (Business Com-
mittee for the Arts 1998, 27).
47. Rosalyn Deutsche has argued that the notion that there is a clear differentiation of
spatial boundaries and their representation (in this case, between public and private, or be-
tween corporate and cultural spaces) restricts a fuller analysis of social space. Thus, the accep-
tance of existing spatial boundaries as legitimate “deter[s] us from investigating the real politi-
cal struggles inherent in the production of all spaces and from enlarging the field of struggles
to make many different kinds of spaces public” (1998, 374–75n121).
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 Bibliography

The following references include books and articles cited in the text. Other sources, including
newspaper articles, cited in notes are not included here. All translations from sources with
German titles, including quotations, are my own. I have also included texts that were useful
in my analyses.
ABC/EUROCOM, comp. 1992. Final Media Report: Annie Leibovitz Exhibition. Frankfurt/M.:
ABC/EUROCOM.
Anderson, Maxwell L. 1997. “Introduction.” In The Wired Museum: Emerging Technology and
Changing Paradigms, ed. Katherine Jones-Garmil, 11–32. Washington, D.C.: American
Association of Museums.
Anna, Susanne, ed. 1997. Standort Deutschland: Ein interdisziplinärer Diskurs zur deutschen
Situation. Symposium und Ausstellung. Heidelberg: Edition Braus.
Atkins, Robert. 1998. “On Edge: Alternative Spaces Today.” Art in America, November, 57–59.
———. 1999. “State of the (On-line) Art.” Art in America, April, 89–95.
Ayub, Ivonne. 1993. “Skepsis bei ai gegenüber Aktionen des Social Sponsoring.” In Social
Sponsoring und Social Marketing: Praxisberichte über das “neue Product Mitgefühl,” ed.
Thomas Leif and Ullrich Galle, 66–69. Cologne: Bund Verlag.
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ABC/EUROCOM, 106, 107
“Absolut Concerto,” 75–76
“Absolut Lee” (Jobim), 76
Absolut Vodka, 62, 70–73, 249nn16, 19;
advertisement for, 74, 249nn13, 14; as
badge product, 82; patronage by, 6–7;
promotion by, 42, 75, 77–78; serializa-
tion of, 71
Acts of Enclosure (Hanhardt), 171
Advanced Research Projects Agency Network
(ARPANET), 263n24
Advertisements, 61, 125, 197, 209; art and,
66; corporate, 25; cultural events and,
89–90; editorial style for, 104; mass-
market, 32; photography and, 121, 126;
popular culture and, 66; print, 231; so-
cial, 82–86, 88–89; tobacco, 30
AEC. See Ars Electronica Center
African Chairs, 206–7
AIDS, 29, 83, 127, 148, 234
Aktion Kontrapunkt, 86
Albers, Josef, 185
Allen, Paul G., 243n5
Allen Foundation for the Arts, 243n5
“All the Colors of the World” campaign,
78–79
Al-Sabah, Saud Nasir, 254n39
Alsford, Stephen, 262n14
American Canvas (NEA), 5, 11, 24, 29, 233,
237
American Century: Art and Culture The, 10, 18
American Express, 30–31, 43, 105, 121, 126,
131, 142; advertisement by, 43, 102–3,
252n2, 256n16; Carmen and, 144; cul-
ture and, 102–3, 108; Leibovitz and, 6, 7,
Index
63, 98, 99, 100, 102, 103, 104, 106–8,
109, 125; “Portraits” campaign and, 100,
102, 108, 110; Rembrandt exhibition
and, 67; sponsorship program by, 41;
Together Again tour and, 31, 66–67
American Friend, The (movie); cultural
tourism and, 117
AMICO. See Art Museum Image Consortium
Ammann, Jean-Christophe, 173
Amnesty International, 29, 80, 82, 83, 88,
158, 159; Human Rights Now!, 157, 158
Anderson, Maxwell, 222, 223
Anheuser-Busch; Calle Oche and, 89
Annie Leibovitz: Photographs, 1970–1990,
121, 252nn2, 6, 7, 254n31; American
Express and, 102, 106–8, 109; brochure
for, 101; cultural sponsorship and, 106;
described, 102, 122, 123; Leibovitz and,
7, 100
Antikensammlung, 56
Aperture: on Leibovitz, 126
Apple Computers, 154
Architecture, 132, 181–85, 208–9; commu-
nication by, 139; corporate, 32, 34, 35
ARD, 83, 107
Arlow, Manni: on Absolut, 75
Arman, Armand, 71
Arnett, Peter, 128, 129, 254n39
Arnold, Tom, 124
ARPANET. See Advanced Research Projects
Agency Network
Ars Electronica Center (AEC), 8, 214, 215,
217, 218, 219, 222, 225; Ars Electronica
Festival and, 215; sponsors of, 216; Web
site of, 261nn4, 7
279
280 Index
Ars Electronica Festival, 215, 216
Art: advertising and, 66; commerce and, 66;
consumption of, 75; contemporary, 49;
convergence/hybridization of, 227; cor-
porate, 49, 50; discourse of, 15; Latino,
94, 95; mass production and, 43; media,
218, 219, 221, 222, 227, 231, 262n14;
national, 57; online, 225; photography
and, 100, 122; politics and, 161, 173; so-
cial symbolism and, 161; sponsoring, 28,
91; technology and, 218, 221; visual, 92
Art & Antiques: Absolut and, 71
Art Institute of Chicago: Monet exhibition
at, 222
“Art in the workplace” programs, 239
Art Museum Image Consortium (AMICO),
262n19
Art of the Motorcycle, The, 18, 112, 188, 208,
248n8, 253n15; celebrity helmet from,
189
“Arts against Hunger: A Global Initiative”
(Philip Morris), 3, 4, 11, 20, 234
Asher, Michael, 52
Assimilation, 34, 86
Association of Austria’s Casinos, 139
AT&T, 7, 248n9; advertisement by, 65;
Calle Oche and, 89; cultural politics and,
6; High and Low and, 64, 65–66; “New
Art/New Visions” program of, 89; spon-
sorship by, 63–64, 66
AT&T Building, 31
Atkins, Robert, 230
Audi, 88, 137
Audiences, 225–27; cultural production and,
145–46; role of, 147, 252–53n11
Aumüller, Jürgen, 107
Auto-Kino, 145
Automobile Club of Germany, 260n30
AutoMuseum Volkswagen, 199, 260n24
Autostadt, 260n24
Avedon, Richard, 102, 125, 251n1, 252n3,
254n30
Avery Fisher Hall, 76
Baca, Judith, 35–36, 38, 168
Bacall, Lauren, 254n32
Back Seat Dodge (Kienholz), 43
Badiola, Txomin, 179
Baghdad House, 255n43
Baker, Rachel: on “Cyberhostess,” 264n36
Ballet Hispanico, 94
BAM. See Brooklyn Academy of Music
Band for Ethiopia, 157
Bankfurt, 137
Barber, Benjamin, 21
Barney, Matthew, 187, 188, 259n10
Barr, Roseanne, 124
Barrett, Tom, 264n36
Barstow, David, 13
Bartender magazine, on Absolut, 77
Barthes, Roland: on photography, 123
Baryshnikov, Mikhail, 126, 127
Baselitz, Georg, 185, 192
Basque culture, 178, 179, 180, 184
Basque government: cultural politics and,
179; GMB and, 178–79, 180, 181
Basquiat, Jean-Michel, 89
Baudrillard, Jean, 37, 255n6
Bauhaus, 204, 214, 218
Baumgart, Hans J., 49
Bavarian Pavilion, 56
Bayern 3, 107
Bayreuth, 137, 255n9; political representa-
tion at, 143
BCA. See Business Committee for the Arts
Beck, Ulrich, 20
Becker, Bettina, 48, 49, 50
Beecher Center for Electronic Arts, 261n3
Beicken, Peter: on Wenders/Germany’s past,
117
Belcher, Alan, 124
Bell Atlantic Foundation, 232
Bell Labs, 226
Benetton: advertising by, 78–80, 250n23;
auto racing and, 250n38; as badge prod-
uct, 82; communities of participation and,
80; controversy about, 82–86, 88–89; so-
cial sponsoring and, 78–80, 81, 82; Web
site of, 80, 250n22
Benjamin, Walter, 52, 73, 132, 255n5
Bennett, Tony, 211
Benson & Hedges Blues Festival: cross-
promotion at, 30
Benz, Carl, 41
Berlin, 88, 161; cultural politics and, 189;
German national identity and, 185
Berlin Hyp: Wrapped Reichstag and, 166
“Berlin 2005,” 258n53

Berlin Wall, 53, 58, 115, 131, 203, 255n43;
Absolut piece of, 76; Wenders and, 117,
129
Bertelsmann, 9, 41
Beuys, Joseph, 185, 192
Beyond Interface, 224
Bhutto, Benazir, 82
Biller, Geraldine P., 94, 251n51
Biolek, Alfred, 193
Biscay government: GMB and, 178–79, 184
Black Art Ancestral Legacy: The African Impulse
in African-American: Art, 94
Bleckner, Ross, 188
Blue, Chris, 148, 149
BMW, 29, 31, 35, 43, 152, 213; Art of the
Motorcycle and, 18, 112, 248n8; cultural
politics and, 6; cultural programs and, 40,
260n25; merchandising by, 45; National
Socialism and, 201; Olympic Village and
Park and, 198; public relations by, 200;
sponsorship program by, 41
BMW Art Car Collection, 44, 47–51, 213,
249n15; as artwork/promotional sym-
bols, 45; attention for, 44; introduction
of, 43
BMW Galleries and Pavilions, 45, 46, 47
BMW Isetta, 208, 209, 213; history/identity
and, 201–4; photo of, 203
BMW Lifestyle (catalog), 45, 47
BMW Museum, 8, 31, 45, 198, 203–4, 208;
described, 197–201; exhibitions at, 207,
209
BMW Museum Experience, The, 197
Body Shop, 88
Bolte, Hans Martin, 199
Bonaventure Hotel, 38
Bonn Republic, 161, 162
Boorstin, Daniel, 255n6
Bouley, Joe, 128, 254n39
Boundaries: cultural, 63; ethical, 13, 14; so-
cial, 31, 70; sociocultural, 65
Bourdieu, Pierre, 42, 255n8
Bowie, David: Sensation and, 12
Boys Don’t Cry (movie), 263n31
Brady, Mathew, 99, 251n1
Brandenburg Gate, 146, 186
Brando, Marlon, 110
Brandon: A One-Year Narrative Project in
Installments: described, 227–28; interfaces
Index 281
in, 229; reception of, 230; representation
of, 230; in virtual space, 228, 229
Brandon Teena Story, The (movie), 227,
263n31
Brandt, Willy, 162
Brauerhoch, Frank-Olaf: on street-fair/
festival culture, 256n11
Braun, Hermann, 120, 253n25
Braun, Maria, 131, 253nn21, 25; Schygulla
as, 118, 119, 120–21
Bregenz Festival, 7, 137–40, 144, 157, 213;
described, 138–39; environment of, 139,
141, 143; sponsors for, 140; visualization
techniques at, 143
Brennan, Timothy, 247n25
Brent Spar (drilling platform), 61, 245n3
Breuer, Rolf, 185, 206
Brinkley, Christy, 254n32
Britto, Romero, 71
Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), 223
Brooklyn Museum of Arts, 12, 13
Bruhn, Manfred, 30, 41
Brychcy, Ulf, 259n7
Buchka, Peter, 145
Buchloh, Benjamin, 52, 124
Buren, Daniel, 52
Bürgerinitiativen, 238
Burgin, Victor: on photography/communi-
cation, 128–29
Business @ the Speed of Thought: Using a
Digital Nervous System (Gates), 216
Business Committee for the Arts (BCA), 26,
27, 239
Calder, Alexander: BMW painting and, 43
California Museum of Latino History, 90
Calle Oche, 89
Campbell, Naomi, 254n32
Campbell’s Soup: Calle Oche and, 89
Campos-Pons, María Magdalena, 94
Carillon Importers, 70, 71, 72, 73, 75, 77
Carmen (Bizet), 138, 139, 144
Carnival, 146
Carnival Miami, 89
Carreras, José, 106, 144
Carstens, Carl: Wrapped Reichstag and, 162
Casey, J. Burton, 36
Cast Concrete (Haacke), 45, 52
Cats (Webber), 144
282 Index
Catunda, Leda, 94
Cave Automatic Virtual Environment
(CAVE), 215, 216
Celebration, Florida, 36
Celebrities: cultural capital of, 106; images of,
99; Other and, 108; photographing, 129
Centre Pompidou, 47, 172, 181
Chase Manhattan Bank, 26, 48, 178
Cheang, Shu Lea, 227, 228, 263n31
Check-Point Charlie Museum, 203
Chia, Sandro: BMW painting by, 43
Children’s Grand Prix Race, 202
Christo, 5, 6, 8, 22, 24, 52, 117, 124, 132,
168, 190; El Tejon Pass and, 167; on
funding, 162, 163; political debate over,
162; on postmodernism, 167; Wrapped
Reichstag and, 63, 98, 161, 163, 240,
255n1
Chrysler, Walther: Daimler-Benz and, 41, 51
Cisco Systems, 18, 258n45
Citibank, 159, 160
Civil society, 11, 21
Clark, Dick, 160
Clegg, Michael, 6, 50, 51, 168, 239, 261n38
Clemente, Francesco, 179
CNN, 128, 129
Coca-Cola, 135, 136; Calle Oche and, 89;
Hands across America and, 159; sponsor-
ship by, 159, 160
Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace (Lessig),
234
Cold War, 161, 185, 186
Colgate-Palmolive: Calle Oche and, 89
Collaboration, 231, 234
Colonialism, 241; corporate, 213; cultural,
253n26; political/economic contexts of,
222
Colors (Benetton magazine), 79
Columbine High School, 219
Commerce: art and, 66; international under-
standing and, 82
Communication, 148, 171, 197, 206, 213,
226, 232, 233; computer-mediated,
261n1; corporate, 29–31, 50, 61, 64,
150, 240; cultural, 17, 208, 212; elec-
tronic, 214; modalities of, 131; museums
and, 139; photography and, 129; pre-
dominant mode of, 70
Communications Center Project, 155
Communications Village, 154
Communities, 88, 145, 148, 238; branded,
232; defining, 89–90, 245n5; of dialogue,
133, 134; interests of, 246n5; virtual, 232
Conradi, Peter: national identity and, 162
Conroy, Marianne, 38
Consciousness-raising, 83, 157
Conspiracy of Hope tour, 158
Consumerism, 23, 66, 194, 240; cultural
politics of, 117
Consuming Places (Urry), 109, 176
Consumption, 61, 80, 160, 206, 236; cul-
tural, 181; economic capital of, 106;
global, 110; identities and, 118; material/
symbolic, 68; online, 232; organized, 78;
subcultures of, 75; technology and, 155;
visual, 109, 143
Corporate Contribution Guidelines (Philip
Morris), 92
Corporate cultural politics, 9, 17, 18, 21,
32, 34, 61, 69, 96, 98, 195, 196, 208,
238; articulating, 36, 38, 39, 214, 233;
containment/social displacement and, 36;
culture and, 3–4, 75, 214; in cyberspace,
231–34; DGB and, 185; economic/social
practices of, 236; emergence of, 6, 8, 24,
72; function of, 3, 5, 213, 234, 239;
globalization of, 3, 21, 38–43, 100, 109,
213, 214; labor relations and, 190; prob-
lems in, 62; public and, 5; self-reflexivity
of, 62; social legitimation and, 5; social
relations and, 240; space and, 36; spon-
sorship and, 78, 91, 143, 160; technology
and, 214
Corporate culture, 23, 51, 196, 210, 239;
contemporary, 113; exporting, 42
Corporate Culture (Haacke), 52
Corporate Cultures: The Rights and Rituals of
Corporate Life (Deal and Kennedy), 42
Corporate Germany, 5, 57, 58, 117, 189, 196
Corporate history: in public forum, 19
Corporate identity, 32, 42, 51, 187, 192,
204; constructing/projecting, 25; cultural
politics of, 57; objectives of, 28; philoso-
phies of, 41
Corporate interests, 28, 238, 241; cultural
interests and, 139; cultural politics and,
240; global, 20; public policy and, 91
Corporate museums, 196–97, 206;

cultural/technological artifacts in, 175;
joint ventures at, 223
Corporate space, 16, 265n47; hybridization
of, 35; politics of, 31–32, 34–38; redefini-
tion of, 36, 241; self-promotion in, 35
Corporations: art contributions from,
264n46; collaboration with, 23; cultural
role of, 24, 197, 244n10; influence of,
30–31, 264n45; museums and, 14, 223;
as social entities, 62; social relations and,
236; technology and, 139
Counterculture, 136, 190
Cowell, Alan, 186
Creativity, sponsoring, 38–43
Crimp, Douglas, 52, 124; on art/commerce,
66; on photography, 99–100, 122; on
radicalized site specificity, 53
Crosby, Stills, and Nash, 152
Crystall Vodka, 249n13
Cultural capital, 12, 106; acquiring, 11, 100,
102–3, 118; currency of, 96; transfer of,
233
Cultural Center Hong Kong: BMW cars at,
47
Cultural centers, 36, 47, 175
Cultural diversity, 66, 73; Philip Morris and,
90; regional, 88
Cultural identities, 57, 61, 186, 256n9; con-
struction of, 69; German, 83, 84; impor-
tance of, 7; medium of, 96; reconfigura-
tion of, 191
Cultural institutions, 10, 13, 21, 67, 97, 137,
177; capital and, 9; colonization of, 241;
corporations and, 24, 244n10; democra-
tization of, 241; managing, 239
Cultural marketplace, 29; museums and,
224; nonprofit institutions and, 23; shifts
within, 63
Cultural policy, 137, 171; foreign, 163, 190,
196; social policies and, 62
Cultural politics, 6, 29, 61, 67, 70, 157, 160,
161; Basques and, 179; contemporary,
210; convergence of, 233; deconstructing,
51–53, 56–58; German, 22, 175, 177,
185, 191; global, 177–81, 210; govern-
ment role in, 175; institutionalizing, 23;
objective of, 5, 57, 195; postunification,
22, 162, 188–89, 258n51; postutopian,
189–96, 212; public, 9, 196; redefining,
Index 283
14, 23, 175, 197; regional, 37, 184; repre-
sentation of, 137; strategies of, 24; urban,
37. See also Corporate cultural politics
Cultural production, 11, 13, 29, 30, 57, 61,
67, 73, 90, 97, 117, 211, 231, 236, 239,
240, 241; audience and, 145–46; corpo-
rate cultural politics and, 75; effectiveness
of, 232; functions of, 125; image of, 141,
142; institutionalized, 151; market-
oriented, 175; performance of, 144–45;
signification of, 140
Cultural programming, 5, 6, 17, 22, 25, 36,
38, 48, 52, 94, 97, 108, 150, 160, 177,
193, 196, 210, 234, 238, 239; analysis of,
63; art/technology and, 40–41; corporate,
10, 145; funding for, 28, 195; globaliza-
tion of, 18; institutionalization of, 27;
paradoxes of, 240; as philanthropy, 28;
professionalization of, 41; public/private
agendas of, 23; sponsoring, 3, 14, 39–40
Culture: alternative, 30, 240; community-
center, 148; consumption of, 37; contem-
porary, 213; as corporate communication,
29–31; discussion of, 69; event, 134, 145,
151, 195, 240; financing of, 9, 239; glob-
alization of, 21, 146; high/low, 29; identi-
ties and, 155; as lifestyle/event, 6; map-
ping, 67–70; media, 7, 23, 69, 134, 137,
148, 151, 240; mediation of, 171; partici-
pation in, 238, 239; production of, 6, 37,
97; promotional, 240; public, 8, 9, 196;
redefining, 61, 97; representation of, 67.
See also Corporate culture; Popular cul-
ture; Youth culture
Culture wars, 10–11, 12
Cyber City, 215
Cybersex, 232
Cyberspace, 37, 224, 240; corporate cultural
politics in, 231–34; transnational corpo-
rations and, 213, 232–33
Dahrendorf, Ralf, 51
Daimler, 246n13; projects by, 8, 36
Daimler, Gottlieb 41
Daimler-Benz, 16, 40, 49; advertisements by,
53; Chrysler and, 41, 51; corporate iden-
tity for, 48; “3D-Video-Visualization”
and, 53
DaimlerChrysler, 18, 36, 37, 48, 51, 246n8,
284 Index
247n23; building projects by, 8; cultural
politics and, 6; sponsorships/public rela-
tions and, 39, 41
DaimlerChrysler Aerospace (DASA), 40, 43
Dancers (Leibovitz), 254n33
Danto, Arthur, 66, 248n7
DASA. See DaimlerChrysler Aerospace
Deal, Terrence, 42
De Amaral, Olga, 94
Dean, James, 110
Debord, Guy: on community of dialogue,
133
De-differentiation, 31, 175, 176, 195, 262n11;
cultural, 29, 38, 248n3; postmodern, 68,
69, 76; sociocultural, 209
DeFanti, Tom, 226
De Kooning, Willem, 179
De Maria, Walter: Five Continents and, 48, 49
Democracy, 234; technology and, 233
DeMontebello, Philippe, 264n41
Der Bevölkerung (Haacke), 16, 52, 240
Der Spiegel, 53, 103, 138
DeSabato, Joe, 249n19
“Desert Storm” series, 128, 129, 131
Design Academy, 148
Deutsche, Rosalyn, 21, 265n47; on public/
space, 37; on representation, 69; on
Shapolsky, 15–16; on social space, 38
Deutsche Aerospace, 40, 247n18. See also
DaimlerChrysler Aerospace
Deutsche Bank, 18, 49, 57, 188; DGB and,
185, 186, 187
Deutsche Guggenheim Berlin (DGB), 18,
22, 57, 177, 185–87, 190; Deutsche
Bank and, 186, 187; SRGF and, 186
Deutsches Museum, 197
Deutsche Telekom: DGB and, 187
Deutschlandbilder : Haacke at, 52
De-verticalization, 67, 68
DGB. See Deutsche Guggenheim Berlin
DG Bank, 50, 239
Di Biumo, Count Giuseppe Panza, 178
Digital Equipment Austria, 216, 261n8
Digital Kienzle, 140, 141
Disney, 9, 190, 215, 232, 246n12, 250nn25,
27; architecture and, 183; cultural politics
and, 37; Las Vegas and, 130; themed en-
vironments and, 38
Disney World, 82, 155
Diverse Roots, Diverse Forms (Philip Morris
video), 95
Diversity, 67, 82, 86, 88, 89–90, 94; ethnic,
238; gender, 90; market, 90; multicultural,
34–35; national, 20; socioeconomic,
238; sponsoring, 38–43. See also Cultural
diversity
DJ Orchestra, 148
“DM über alles” (Haacke), 57
Do Amaral, Tarsila, 94
Dobusch, Franz, 215
Documenta, 31
documenta x: Haacke at, 52
Donaher, Paul, 71, 249n13
Done, Ken: BMW painting by, 43
DOOM, 219, 220, 262n13
“Do You Know Me?” series, 103
Dresdner Bank, 186, 259n7
Drive-in movies, 146
Duchamp, Marcel, 122
DuPont Tyvek, 187
Duve, Freimut: national identity and, 162
Eames, Charles, 204, 206
Eames, Ray, 204, 206
Easy Rider (movie), 188, 257n33
EAT. See Experiments in Art in Technology
Eau Techno, 150
Eavesdropping, 64–65, 248n5
Eco, Umberto, 255n8
Ecology Gallery, 172
Economic capital, 12, 106, 233
Economic development, 38, 140, 143, 234,
247n15; cultural interests and, 91, 97
Economic Miracle, 135, 201, 202, 253n25
Education, 82, 250n27, 261n6; convergence/
hybridization of, 227; support for, 90, 91
Eichinger, Bernd, 107
“Ein Sachse,” 83, 84–85, 84, 87
Eisenman, Peter, 52, 240, 243n2
El Banco Bilbao Vizcaya: GMB and, 178
El Tejon Pass project, 167
Engholm, Bjorn, 138
Engineers, 225–27
Enssle, Manfred, 168; on Christo/Jeanne-
Claude, 133; on Wrapped Reichstag, 134,
161, 162, 167
Entartete Kunst, 16
Entrepreneurship, 40, 43, 73, 117

Environments, 34, 139, 143, 234, 245n3;
image of, 141, 142; multisensory, 155;
postmodernist, 38; real, 37; social, 38,
140; technology and, 200; themed/event,
38, 155
Epcot, 82
Epsen, Hal: on Woodstock, 156, 255n3
Erleben, event as, 134–37
Erlebnis, 31, 37, 85, 109, 139, 152, 195;
structuring of, 135–36
Erlebnis-Café, 215
Erlebnisgesellschaft, 23
Erlebnismarkt, 23, 175, 212
Erlebnis-Mix, 145
Ernst & Young, 41
ESB. See European Sponsoring Exchange
ETA. See Euskadi ta Askatasuna
Ethnicity, 85, 86, 89, 96, 238, 256n9; accen-
tuating, 90; hate crimes and, 83; socio-
cultural significance of, 84
Europa Center: Haacke and, 53
European Sponsoring Exchange (ESB), 38,
86, 247n17
Eurostar: shopping packages from, 176
Euskadi ta Askatasuna (ETA), 178
Evans, Walker, 122
Events, 134, 145, 147, 151, 195, 240;
centrality of, 25; commodification of,
138; local, 90; open-air, 144–46; social,
132; symbolic function of, 136. See also
Mega-events
Exhibitions: financing, 14; globalization of,
13; myth making at, 204; policies, 12;
receiving, 211
Experience Music Project Foundation, 243n5
Experiences: site/medium of, 136
Experiments in Art in Technology (EAT),
225, 226
“Eye of Annie Leibovitz, The” (Life), 126–27
Fabo, Sabine, 224
Families: changes in, 86, 88
Farm Aid, 157, 258n45
Fasching, 146
Fassbinder, Rainer Werner, 118, 120, 121,
253n26
Fehlbaum, Rolf, 204
Feldmann, Bernd: on Bregenz Festival, 138,
139, 141; on festivals/promotion, 142
Index 285
Festivals, 29, 135, 137, 138, 154; cultural
production and, 143; image of, 140, 141,
157; promotion and, 142
Fidelio (Mozart), 138, 141; megaproduction
of, 139; wall for, 143–44
Fiesta del Sol, 89
Filmfest München, 31
Fischer, Joschka: on national identity/
postnational federation, 20
Fitzgerald, Ella, 99
Five Continents (De Maria), 43–45, 47–51
Flying Dutchman, The (Wagner), 139, 141
Fohrbeck, Karla, 32
Foley, Raymond: on Absolut, 77
Forbes, 72
Forbes, Malcolm, 112
Ford Center for the Performing Arts, 37
Ford Foundation, 10, 26, 237
Ford Motor Company, 231, 237, 245n4,
264n33; auto racing and, 250n38; spon-
sorship by, 246n14; Times Square and,
37; Web site of, 231
Ford Motor Company Fund, 231, 264n33
Forest of Pillars (Eisenman), 243n2
Foster, Norman, 31, 52
Foster’s Beer: auto racing and, 250n38
Fotodesign + Technik: Schygulla on cover,
253n21
Foucault, Michel, 132, 255n2
Foundations, 22, 23, 237, 238
Frailey, Stephen, 124
Frankfurt Museum for Modern Art, 173
Frankfurt School, 66
Frank Lloyd Wright: The Living City, 206
Frantz, Justus: festival and, 256n10
Franz-Josef Strauss Airport, 137
Freedom Is Now Simply Going To Be
Sponsored—out of Petty Cash (Haacke),
52, 53, 54
Freeman, Laurie: on advertisers/cultural
events, 89–90
Friedman, Thomas L., 18, 20
Friends of the Museum, 238
Friends of the National Gallery: Sensation
and, 13
Fritsch, Katharina, 173
Frohne, Ursula, 221
Fuchs, Ernst: BMW painting by, 43
Full disclosure, 12–13, 241
286 Index
Funding, 83, 85, 157, 237, 238; corporate,
6, 10, 163, 192; cultural, 23; local, 195;
private, 192; public, 10, 163
Futura Sarajewo techno festival, 160
Gabriel, Peter, 154
Galluzi, Miquel, 209
Gap, The, 99, 125, 126, 250n25, 252n2
Garofalo, Reebee: on mega-events, 157, 158,
159
Garrin, Paul, 219
Gates, Bill: digital ideology and, 216
Gay concerns: advertising to, 77
Gehry, Frank, 8, 243n5, 246n12; GMB and,
139, 178, 179, 180, 181, 182, 183, 218;
Guggenheim and, 259n1; Little Beaver
chair of, 207; modernist architecture and,
184; motorcycles and, 208; VDM and,
204–5; Wright and, 182
Geldof, Bob: on mega-events, 159
General Cinema Corporation:
MINDBENDER and, 154
Generation X, 147, 156, 256n24; Benetton
and, 79, 80
Generation Y, 147, 156, 256n24; Benetton
and, 80; clothing and, 250n23
Genesis: Volkswagen and, 195
Gere, Richard, 158
Gericom, 261n8
Germania (Haacke), 52, 56, 57
German National Pavilion, 52, 56
Gesamtkunstwerk, 219
Getty Center, 22
Getty Foundation, 22
Getty Information Institute, 262n19
Getty Museum, 210
Getty Trust, 210
Gibson, Katherine: on postmodernist inter-
vention, 38
Gibson, William, 261n1
Gifford, Kathie Lee, 250n25
Giorgio Armani, 12, 237, 244n20; sponsor-
ship agreement with, 14–15
Giorgio Armani (Guggenheim Museum), 14,
15; poster for, 174
Giroux, Henry A., 79, 261n6
Giuliani, Rudolph: Sensation and, 12
Glass, Philip: photo of, 74
Glastonbury Festival, 156
Global Guggenheim: Selections from the
Extended Collection, The, 259n1
Globalization, 3, 6, 18–19, 41, 45, 78–80,
82, 88, 154, 186; corporate, 8, 9, 20, 21,
48, 109; cultural, 144; economic mobility
and, 48; German economy and, 9; GMB
and, 180; media, 144; resistance to, 236;
theories of, 38
Glyptothek, 56
GMB. See Guggenheim Museum Bilbao
Godfather, The (movie), 249n15
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von, 53
Goldberger, Paul: on Basques, 178, 184; on
ETA, 178; on Gehry/GMB, 183
Goldsmith’s College: YBAs at, 14
Goldstein, Bill, 255n47
Gopnik, Adam, 64, 66
Gordon, Avery, 23, 34–35
Gourmet, 94
Graf, Christof: on open-air events, 145
Graham, Dan, 34, 35
Grand Hotel, 36, 53
Grasskamp, Walter, 57, 72, 73; on de-
differentiation, 176; on Haacke, 56; on
museum administration, 180; on social
functions, 176–77
Grateful Dead, 152
Graves, Michael, 246n12
Great Wall of Los Angeles, The (Baca), 168
Green, Linda, 130
Greenpeace, 80, 82, 83, 88, 159
Grossberg, Lawrence, 143, 147, 257n26
Guest workers, 190
Guggenheim family, 12, 16, 72
Guggenheim Foundation, 22
Guggenheim Las Vegas, 177
Guggenheim Museum Bilbao (GMB), 10,
22, 139, 177, 178, 188, 218, 234, 236;
architecture of, 181–85; Basque context
of, 181, 184; globalization and, 180; in-
digenous culture/economic development
and, 184; operation of, 179; photo of,
182; promotion of, 186; SRGF and, 184;
visitors to, 209
Guggenheim Museum SoHo New York,
177
Guggenheim Virtual Museum, 8, 227
Guibord, Jacqueline Phillips, 254n39
Gulf War: Leibovitz and, 126–31

Guttmann, Martin, 6, 51, 168, 239, 261n38;
DG Bank and, 50
Haacke, Hans, 16, 24, 45, 80, 117, 125;
controversy about, 52; cultural politics/
national identity and, 51–53, 56–58;
Georgio Armani and, 17; German identity
and, 243n2; installations by, 6, 51–52, 57;
National Socialism/Venice and, 248n36;
site specificity and, 53, 240
Häagen-Dazs: Woodstock ’94 and, 152
Habermas, Jürgen, 167, 233
Hadid, Zaha, 260n24
Haenlein, Carl, 191, 192, 201
Hamburger Bahnhof: Sensation at, 13
Hamburg Media Arts Festival, 150, 220
Hamlet (Shakespeare), 53
Hancock, Herbie, 158
Hands across America, 159, 160, 161
Hanhardt, John G., 171, 172
Hannerz, Ulf, 41, 42
Hans Haacke: Systems, 15
Hans Haacke: Unfinished Business, 14–18
Haring, Keith, 71, 124
Harley-Davidson, 112, 253n14
Hatch, Connie, 122
Hate crimes, 83, 85, 88
Haus der Kunst, 172, 173, 194; Entartete
Kunst exhibition at, 16
Heilig, Morton, 226
Heinrichs, Werner, 9, 195
Helms, Jesse, 53
“Helmsboro” cigarettes, 53, 56
Hendrickson, Matt, 156
Hendrix, Jimi, 152
Herbie (movie), 190
Hewlett-Packard Austria, 261n8
Heyman, I. Michael, 24–25
Hickey, David, 15
High and Low: Modern Art and Popular Cul-
ture, 248n8; advertisement for, 64–65,
65; controversy over, 66; sponsorship of,
63–64, 66
High art, 67; popular culture and, 63, 66
High culture, 3, 11, 36, 64, 65, 66, 136, 148,
195; modernism and, 68; sponsorships
and, 62
Himmelblau, Coop, 182
Hispanic Day, 89
Index 287
Hitler, Adolf, 56, 57, 262n9
Hoffman, Abbie: Woodstock and, 154
Hoffmann, Hilmar: on culture, 67, 137, 195
Höhler, Gertrud, 247n26, 253n23; American
Express advertisement and, 43
Holbrooke, Richard, 185
Holler, Asta, 191
Holler Group, 191
Holler Stiftung, 191
Hollingsworth, Tony, 157
Holocaust, 17, 58
Holocaust Fund, 248n37
Holocaust Memorial, 5, 52, 58, 189, 240,
243n2, 258n51
Holy Virgin Mary, The (Ofili), 1
Homage to New York (Tinguely), 226
Honda, 158
Hopf, Eric, 150
Hop Hopf Schmitz und Schmitz, 150
Hopper, Dennis, 188
House of Information (Eisenman), 243n2
Hoyos, Ana Mercedes, 94
Hughes, Harold, 226
Hugo Boss, 8, 12, 15, 194; DGB and, 187,
188
Hugo Boss Prize, 187, 188
Human rights, 20, 83
Hunger in Africa, 83
Hussein, Saddam, 53, 129, 255n44
Hutcheon, Linda, 56, 100, 123, 253n28
Huyssen, Andreas, 204; on museums, 171,
210, 211
Hybridization, 29, 35, 176, 227
Hyde, James, 209, 248n8
Hyperstores, 155
Hypo-Bank, 42, 48
IBM, 35, 42, 236, 246n8; community part-
nerships and, 32, 33; cultural politics
and, 6; poster about, 19
IBM Atrium and Museum, 35
Identities: Basque, 179; binary/assimilationist
view of, 84; brokering, 92, 94–98; com-
munal, 168; construction of, 83, 88, 98,
100, 181; contemporary, 213; cultural, 7,
57, 61, 69, 83, 84, 96, 155, 186, 187, 191;
cultural politics of, 126–31; economic,
143; ethnic, 86, 96, 256n9; gender, 34;
German, 58, 88, 243n2; Latin American,
288 Index

95, 96; political, 143; postmodern, 118, Jobim, Antonio Carlos, 76

121–26; private, 51; product, 143; racial, Johns, Jasper, 27, 122, 226
34; regional, 28, 63, 78, 143, 157; self- Johnson, Lyndon: NEA/NEH and, 26
fulfillment and, 112; shared, 32; social, Johnson, Philip: AT&T Building and, 31
78, 84–85, 145; subcultural, 150. See also Johnson’s Wax Building, 31
Corporate identity; National identity Jones, Bill T., 97
Imaged self: self-image and, 123 Joop, Wolfgang, 15, 173, 193, 194
Image Media, 218 Joop! perfume, 194
Images: amplification of, 30; characteristics
of, 135; communication/transfer of, 108; Kahlo, Frida, 94
corporate, 39, 83, 91, 140, 213; cultural, Karlsruhe: ZKM and, 218
24; promotion of, 22, 25; sponsorships Karneval, 146
and, 31 Kayama, Matazo: BMW painting by, 43
Image transfer, 7, 10, 140 Kellner, Douglas, 70; on contemporary cul-
IMAX, 155 ture, 121; on media culture, 69; on per-
INFOWAR, 216, 217–18, 217 sonal identity, 131; on Stallone, 254n35;
In Search of Excellence (Peters and Waterman), on Woodstock, 257n33
42, 247n24 Kennedy, Allan, 42
Institute for Music and Acoustics, 218 Kennedy, Brian: on funding practices, 13
Institut für Neue Medien, 214, 227 Kiefer, Anselm, 179
Institutions: objectives of, 23, 25, 241; private, Kienholz, Ed, 43
238; public, 23, 29, 97, 236–37, 238; so- Kindermöbel: The Material World of Child-
cial, 21, 97. See also Cultural institutions hood, 206
In Style, 15 Kings of the Road (movie): cultural tourism
Intar Hispanic American Theater, 94 and, 117
Intel Corporation, 10, 223 Kinkel, Klaus: Corporate Germany and, 5,
InterCommunication Center, 214 57, 189, 196
International Center of Photography: Leibo- Kittler, Friedrich, 221
vitz and, 100 Klein, Naomi, 20, 236
International Salsa Festival, 89 Klestil, Thomas, 256n15
Internet, 155, 223, 224, 234, 263n24; mar- Klotz, Heinrich: on art/technology, 218
ket research and, 232; mega-events and, Kluver, Billy, 226
157, 258n45; NEA and, 233; projects on, KMW. See Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg
221; Quelle and, 215 Knowledge Net, 215
Irazazábal, Prudencio, 179 Knox, George L.: on sponsorship/business, 92
Isozaki, Arata, 182, 246n12 Kodak, 7, 90
Installations, 6, 51–52, 57; site-specific, 225, Kohl, Helmut, 162, 163, 258n51
240 Kolker, Robert: on Wenders/Germany’s past,
Italian Cultural Institute, 193 117
Italian Summer, 193 Königsplatz, 52, 53, 56
Italienische Metamorphose: 1949–1968, 193 Koons, Jeff, 179
Kopper, Hilmar, 186
Jahn, Helmut, 246n12 KPMG, 41, 258n45
Jameson, Fredric, 38 Kraft-durch-Freude, 190, 259n11
Jeanne-Claude, 5, 6, 24, 52, 117, 132, 168, Krauss, Rosalind, 124
190; on funding, 163; political debate Krens, Thomas, 186, 259n1, 260n33; global-
over, 162; Wrapped Reichstag and, 63, 98, ization strategy of, 177, 185, 209; GMB
161, 163, 240, 255n1 and, 179, 180–81, 182; Hugo Boss Prize
Jewish Museum, 209 and, 187; SRGF and, 178

Krings, Charlotte, 199
Kroker, Marilouise: on rhetoric machine, 216
Krueger, Myron, 226
Kruger, Barbara, 63, 69, 99, 254n42
Kunsthal Rotterdam, 206
Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg (KMW), 8, 15,
197, 208, 237; described, 192, 201;
exhibiting Italy at, 194; Joop at, 173;
Volkswagen and, 189–96
Kunststiftung Volkswagen, 191
LAAs. See Local arts associations
Labor relations, 61, 91, 190, 250n25
Lacayo, Richard: on Leibovitz, 99
Lachmeyer, Herbert: on creative chaos, 42
Lafontaine, Marie-Jo, 219
Lagerfeld, Karl, 173, 194
Lake Constance, 140, 142
Lang, Fritz, 181
Lang, Michael, 156
La Scala opera, 237
Lash, Scott, 68, 248n3
Las Vegas, 37, 126–31
Latin American Spirit: Art and Artists in the
United States, 1920–1970, The, 94
Latin American Women Artists: 1915–1995:
and Biller, 251n51; Philip Morris and, 92,
94–98; promoting, 93
Lauder, Leonard, 246n9
Lawler, Louise, 125
Led Zeppelin, 152
Leibovitz, Annie, 63, 118, 123, 129, 252nn5,
7; on advertising work, 126; American
Express and, 6, 7, 43, 98–100, 103, 106–8,
125; casinos and, 131; photographs by,
74, 107, 120–21; on photography manipu-
lation, 124; publicity for, 108; sponsor-
ship of 101
Leirner, Jac, 94
Lennon, John, 99, 124, 254n31
Leo, Vince, 122
Leopoldseder, Hannes, 215
Leske, Marion: on Saatchi System, 14
Lessig, Lawrence: on cyberspace, 234
Lewis, Richard, 72
Libeskind, Daniel, 209
Lichtenstein, Roy, 27, 43
Life: Leibovitz in, 99, 126–27, 254n42
Lifestyle: marketing, 22, 79, 150
Index 289
Lifestyle and Event Marketing (Pottasch), 22
“Light American” cigarettes, 148
Lincoln Center, 158
Lindner, Richard, 173
Lingner, Michael, 50
Little Beaver chair, 205, 207
Live Aid, 157, 159, 258n45
Living Library, A (Sherk), 168
Local arts associations (LAAs), 11, 234,
264n39
Lockheed: children’s museum by, 36
Louvre: BMW cars at, 47
Love-Modul, 148, 150
Love Parade, 146, 147, 148
Lucent Technologies, 223
Luers, William H., 264n41
Lufthansa, 43, 237; DGB and, 187; festivals
and, 137; promotions by, 220
Luis Barragan, 206
Luke, Timothy: on Hispanic identity, 96
Macdonald, Bradley, 168; on Christo/Jeanne-
Claude, 133; on Wrapped Reichstag, 134,
161, 162, 167
MacDonald, George: meta-museum and,
262n14
Magic Flute (Mozart), 138
Mahlangu, Esther: “Art Cars” and, 43, 45, 47
Majore, Frank, 124
Mall of America, 257n40
MAM. See Milwaukee Art Museum
Management: corporate models of, 23; cul-
tural, 160; diversity, 34–35; philosophies
of, 41; social policy and, 42
Managers: as artist-entrepreneurs, 49; as
creative artists, 42–43
Männer Vogue: Leibovitz in, 127, 128
Manrique, César: BMW painting by, 43
Marathon Man (movie), 219
March of the Anal Sadistic Warrior, The
(Barney), 187
Mardi Gras, 146
Marketing, 92, 94–98, 147; brand-name,
91; cause-related, 29; current-event, 22;
ethnic, 89; event-centered, 75–76; global-
ization of, 88; Internet and, 232; Philip
Morris and, 90; regional, 218; social, 88,
249n20
Marlboro man, 129
290 Index
Marriage of Maria Braun, The (movie):
identity/consumption in, 118
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 226
Matisse, 192
Matzig, Gerhard, 246n13
Mayday Party, 146
MBB. See Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm
McGregor, Fiona: BRANDON and, 263n28
McKinney, David E., 264n41
McRobbie, Angela: on rave culture, 146
MC Solaar, 148
Mears, Mary Ann: on cultural projects, 38
Media, 27, 29, 32, 70, 107, 216, 233,
230–31, 244n11; art/culture and, 227;
coverage by, 13, 17, 30, 83, 144; cultural,
14, 158; digital, 213; electronic, 221;
globalization of, 144; influence of, 163;
interactive, 226–27; interconnectedness
of, 219; mediatization of, 221; museums
and, 219, 224; new, 223; promotional,
104; public relations and, 42; subculture
and, 147, 150; technology and, 261n6;
Wrapped Reichstag and, 167
Media Museum, 218
Media Theater, 218
Mediathek, 218
Mediation, 24, 29, 96, 97, 241; cultural, 14,
78; institutional, 171; material/symbolic,
68
Medosch, Armin, 232
Meffire, Sam Njankono: “Ein Sachse” and,
83, 84–85
Mega-events, 157–61; corporate involvement
in, 158; Internet and, 157, 258n45; ma-
nipulation of, 158; political power of, 159;
potential of, 158–59, 161; subculture
and, 159. See also Events
MEGA Interactive Festivals, Ltd.: on Surreal
Field, 154
“Membership has its privileges” campaign,
104, 105
Memory: counter-hegemonic, 172; cultural,
167; historical, 167; personal culture of,
204
Mendieta, Ana, 94
Mercedes-Benz, 29, 53
Mercedes star, 55, 56
Merkley, Parry, 103
Merz, 192
MESL. See Museum Educational Site Licens-
ing Project
Messer, Thomas, 16
Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm (MBB), 40
Meta-museums, 214–22, 225, 262n14
Metropolis (Lang), 181
Metropolitan Museum of Art, 180, 236
Metropolitan Opera, 255n9
Meyer, Claus Heinrich, 107
Meyer, Stephen: on Leibovitz, 103–4
MGM: Las Vegas and, 130
Microsoft, 126, 232, 243n5
Microsoft Austria: on INFOWAR, 216
Migenes, Julia, 144
Migrants, 84
Mikus, Anne, 197, 260n20
Milk mustaches, 125
Miller Brewing Company, 91, 92, 94, 251n49
Milwaukee Art Museum (MAM), 251nn44,
48, 51; Latin American Women Artists at,
92; sponsorships with, 94
MINDBENDER (Gabriel): sponsorship of,
154
Mind Expansion Village, 154, 155
Ministers of culture, 149
MIP. See Museum Informatics Project
Mitchell, Margaret, 29
Mitsubishi Motors Corp., 140, 141
Mixed-use development (MUD), 35, 36
Mobility, 109, 110, 113, 117, 213; economic,
48, 112; upward, 201
Modera, Wolfgang, 261n7
Modernism, 211; high culture and, 68; pho-
tography and, 135; postmodernism and,
122, 181
Monet, 222
Monroe, Marilyn, 183
MOO (multi-user object-oriented program-
ming), 228
Moore, Charles, 246n12
Moraza, Juan Luis, 179
Morley, David, 88, 245n5
Morris, Mark, 126, 127
Morse, George, 199
Motorinen- und Turbinen-Union (MTU), 40
MSM. See Münchener Stadtmuseum
MTV, 83, 145
MUD. See Mixed-use development
Multiculturalism, 7, 45, 82, 83, 85, 88, 95;

corporate, 35; mediation of, 96; promo-
tion of, 92; redefining culture and, 97
Multimedia theaters, 155
Multinational corporations, 36, 41, 64,
246n8; auto racing and, 250–51n38;
ethnic marketing and, 89–90
Münchener Stadtmuseum (MSM), 252n6;
Leibovitz at, 106, 107, 108
Muschamp, Herbert: on GMB, 182–83, 184
Museum Educational Site Licensing Project
(MESL), 262n19
Museum 540, 261n3
Museum for the Workplace (Clegg and Gutt-
mann), 43–45, 47–51, 168
Museum Informatics Project (MIP), 262n19
Museum of American Folk Art: Roux at, 73
Museum of Contemporary Art, 218
Museum of Erotic Art, 148
Museum of Modern Art: High and Low and,
64
Museum of Native American Art: Roux at, 73
Museum of Science and Art, 35
Museum of the Future, 215
“Museum or Amusement Park?” (Rawsthorn),
209
Museums: children’s, 36; communication by,
139; contemporary, 172; corporations and,
14, 35, 223; cultural marketplace and, 172,
224; cultural productions at, 224; democ-
ratization of, 211; designing, 201, 208,
214; digital, 214; effectiveness of, 211;
global, 177–89, 206, 210; media and, 219,
224; mission of, 172, 176–77; politics
and, 181; privatization of, 189–96; pro-
gramming by, 223; promotions by, 223;
redefining, 8, 172, 175, 177; sponsors
and, 13, 35, 90, 214; survival for, 212;
technology and, 176, 210; virtual, 221,
222–25, 262n16; visiting, 209, 210–22
Muska, Susan, 263n31
Nabisco, 251n49
NAFTA. See North American Free Trade
Agreement
NASA, 226
National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), 5,
22, 26, 27; collaboration and, 234; culture
wars and, 12; grants from, 10–11, 226;
Internet and, 233; report by, 24
Index 291
National Endowment for the Humanities
(NEH), 26
National Fluid Milk Processor Promotion
Board, 125, 254n32
National Gallery of Australia: Sensation and,
13
National History Museum, 172
National identity, 20, 78, 86, 89, 115, 162,
187, 204; cultural politics of, 161; decon-
structing, 51–53, 56–58; German, 185;
politics of, 63
National Labor Committee (NLC), 250n25,
264n40
National Portrait Gallery: Leibovitz and,
100
National Socialism, 17, 44, 262n9; BMW
and, 201; cultural politics and, 56–57;
Haus der Kunst and, 173; Königsplatz
and, 53; Venice and, 248n36; Volkswagen
and, 190
Nauman, Bruce, 219
Naumann, Michael, 58, 189, 258n51
NBC, 35
NEA. See National Endowment for the Arts
NEH. See National Endowment for the
Humanities
Nelson, Michael Jagamara: BMW painting
by, 43
Net Aid, 18, 258n45
Net_Condition, 222
Neue Pinakothek, 197
“New Art/New Visions” (AT&T), 89
New German Filmmakers: cultural coloniza-
tion and, 253n26
New Museum of Contemporary Art: Haacke
at, 16
New Yorker, The, 64, 71; Leibovitz in, 122,
129, 130, 131, 254n42
New York State Council on the Arts, 26
New York Times, 13, 255n47; advertisements
in, 53, 71; on GMB, 182–83; on Rock-
well, 155
Nixon, Richard, 122
NLC. See National Labor Committee
No Logo (Klein), 20
Nonprofit organizations, 21, 22, 82, 151,
160, 233, 236, 239; colonization of, 241;
cultural funding by, 14; cultural market-
place and, 23; donations to, 237; interests
292 Index
of, 241; social marketing and, 88; support
for 90
North American Free Trade Agreement
(NAFTA), 251n51
Ofili, Chris, 12
Ogilvy & Mather, 104
Ohmae, Kenichi, 41
Olafsdottir, Greta, 263n31
Olympic Games, 198
Olympic Village and Park: BMW and, 198
“One World/One Store” (Benetton), 80, 81
Ono, Yoko, 99, 124, 254n31
On the Museums Ruins (Crimp), 121–22
Open-air movies, 145–46
Opera, 137–40, 141
Oracle, 216, 261n8
ORF: Prix Ars Electronica and, 215
Oswald, 120, 121
Our Common Cause, 158
Outdoor Funshot Studio, 90
Pacheco, María Luisa, 94
Packaging: promotion and, 66–67
Pacovsky, John, 71
Paik, Nam June, 219, 226
Palazzo Grassi: BMW cars at, 47
Panasonic, 158
Pariser Platz, 186, 259n7
Paris Texas (movie): cultural tourism and, 117
Participation, 80, 238; audience, 147; corpo-
rate, 29
Partnerships, 25, 26–29, 40, 97, 218, 231,
238; building, 78; community, 32, 82;
corporate, 29; customer, 159; IBM and,
32, 33; public-private, 175; social capital
and, 12
“Party in the Museum,” 173
Party-keller, 202
Patriarchal tradition, 32, 40
Patronage, 6, 26, 75, 92, 238; historical,
73; private, 175; sponsoring philosophy
of, 72
Pavarotti, Luciano, 104, 252n5
Peggy Guggenheim Collection, 177
Peirce, Kimberly, 263n31
Penck, A. R.: BMW painting by, 43
Penn, Irving, 102
Penny, Simon, 226–27
Pepsi-Cola, 22, 58; sponsorship by, 157;
Woodstock ’94 and, 152
Perez de Cuellar, Javier, 254n39
Performances, live, 145, 224
Peters, Thomas, 42
Phantom of the Opera (Webber), 144
Philanthropy, 3, 6, 26, 249n20
Philip Morris and the Arts: 35 Year Report
(Philip Morris), 90, 92
Philip Morris Companies, 7, 26, 73, 97, 148,
150; arts and, 27, 173, 234; auto racing
and, 250n38; corporate headquarters of,
35; corporate infrastructure of, 26; cul-
tural politics and, 6; guidelines by, 90, 92;
MAM and, 92, 94; proposal by, 3; public
promotions by, 91–92; sponsorship by,
41, 90; video by, 95
Philip Morris Companies Incorporated
Corporate Contribution Guidelines, 90
Philip Morris Superband, 31
Philips Media, 154
Photography: advertisement and, 121, 126;
art and, 100, 102, 122; celebrity, 104,
105, 124; communication and, 129;
documentary-style, 79; editorial, 104;
manipulation of, 124; modern, 135; post-
modern, 99–100, 121–26, 128; promo-
tional, 102
Picasso, Pablo, 192
Pinakothek der Moderne, 192
Pink Floyd, 143, 195
Place: cultural politics of, 126–31
Pluralism, 63, 66, 67, 97
Politics, 18, 20, 82, 126, 157, 231; art and,
173; cultural/institutional, 181; culture
and, 5, 156–57; identity, 22, 92, 230;
image, 187–88; public sphere of, 163
Polke, Sigmar, 179
PolyGram Diversified Ventures, 152, 257n36
Pop & Op: Philip Morris and, 27
Popular culture, 64, 65, 68, 98; advertise-
ment and, 66; diversity of, 209; high art
and, 63, 66
Porsche, Ferdinand, 190
Portman, John, 38
“Portraits” campaign, 43, 100, 107, 108,
109–10, 113, 121, 128, 129; designing,
102–6; effectiveness of, 103; exclusivity/
mobility in, 110

Post Futura, 160
Postmodernism, 38, 68, 100, 115, 129, 134,
167, 211, 213, 240; modernism and, 122,
181; oppositional, 125
Potsdamer Platz, 8, 16, 18, 53, 57; Haacke
in, 52; redevelopment of, 36
Pottasch, Alan: quote of, 22
Poulain, Hervé: BMW painting and, 43
Poutney, David, 141
Powell, Colin, 254n39
Premiere, 264n31
Privatization, 29, 52, 109, 227; corporatiza-
tion and, 20; economic, 189–90; social
policies of, 88
Prix Ars Electronica, 215, 261n8
Pro Cash Installation, 262n8
Promotion, 61, 80, 155, 188; corporate,
160; cross-, 30; cultural, 23, 24, 26, 70,
78, 113, 137; mass, 161; packaging and,
66–67; politics of, 143; product/image,
28–29, 30, 236; social, 78
Psychographics, 135
Public discourse, 37, 167, 233, 234
Public forum: corporate history in, 19
Public institutions, 97; collaboration with,
23; privatization of, 29, 236–37
Public policy, 234, 236, 245n28; contesting,
90–91; corporate interests and, 91, 231;
formulation of, 25, 28
Public relations, 26, 35, 38, 48, 61, 171,
196, 199; BMW, 200; media and, 42;
sponsorships and, 39
Public space, 16, 37; hybridization of, 35;
privatization of, 109; redefinition of, 162,
241
Puerto Rican Day, 89
Quelle, Internet and, 215
Raise the Flag (Haacke), 52, 53; photo of, 56
Rajchman, John, 255n2
Ramírez, Mimi Carmen, 95, 96
RAND, ARPANET and, 263n24
Rauschenberg, Robert, 43, 122, 226
Rave culture, 146, 147, 150, 154, 213
Ravestock, 154, 213
Rawsthorn, Alice, 209
Rebay, Hilla, 185
Reebok, 157, 158
Index 293
Reemtsma, Zvesdochotov and, 150
Reichstag: Haacke and, 16, 52, 53; ideologies
of, 168; representation of, 167; symbolism
of, 55, 162, 167; unification and, 161;
Wenders and, 117
Reinboth, Michael, 148; photo of, 149
Rembrandt exhibition: promotion of, 67
Repertorio Espanol, 94
Representation, 22, 67, 68, 97, 115, 137,
167, 230; collective, 96; feminist aesthet-
ics of, 69; political, 126, 143; social, 126
Reuter, Edzard, 49
Rheingold, Howard, 226, 261n1; on
ARPANET/RAND, 263n24; on public
discourse, 233
Richard, Birgit, 256n21
Ring cycle (Wagner), 137, 255n9
Ritchie, Ian: on Centre Pompidou, 172
Ritts, Herb, 102, 125
Rivendell Marketing, 249n19
R. J. R. Reynolds Tobacco, 150
Robb, David, 209
Robins, Kevin, 88, 245–246n5
Rock against Racism, 157
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum,
176, 248n9, 257n35
Rock concerts, 29, 83, 144–45; audiences at,
252–53n11
Rockefeller, David: BCA and, 26
Rockefeller, Nelson: New York State Council
on the Arts and, 26
Rockefeller Center, 35
Rockwell, David, 155
Rocky Horror Picture Show, The (movie), 145,
146
Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes (Barthes),
123, 253–54n28
Rolling Stone (magazine), 100, 103, 248n9,
257n43; “Absolut Lee” and, 76; Leibovitz
in, 99, 104, 122, 125, 126, 252n2,
253n27; on Woodstock, 156
Rolling Stones, 29, 71, 99, 139, 144
Rolling Stones Voodoo Lounge Tour, 144;
Volkswagen and, 48, 71, 195
Ronald McDonald Houses, 29
Rosenquist, James, 27, 187
Rosler, Martha, 122
Rosso Bianco Collection, 260n30
Roth, Peter: on festivals, 137
294 Index
Rothko, Mark, 179
Roux, Michel, 62, 73, 75, 77, 249nn16, 17;
Absolut and, 42, 70, 71, 72
Rowlands, Jeff: Woodstock ’94 and, 257n36
RTL, 83, 107
Rundgren, Todd, 154
Ruscha, Ed, 71, 122
Saab, 249n19
Saatchi Collection, 12
Sächsische Zeitung, 83, 84; Benetton and, 85;
“Ein Sachse” in, 87
Sägebrecht, Marianne, 107, 118
Salamon, Lester, 11, 12
Sales and Marketing Management, 72
Salzburg Festival, 138
Sandin, Dan, 226
Sarajevo, 126–31, 160, 161
Sarajevo Is Next (SiN), 160, 161
Sarajevo Music Forum (SMF), 160
Sarajlic, Adi, 160
SAT 1, 107
Savary, Jerome, 138
Sayers, Gay, 226
Scetchpad (movie), 226
Schäfer, Anja, 128
Scharz, Hans-Peter, 226
Schauble, Wolfgang: cultural politics and, 162
Scher, John, 152, 156
Schiff, Stephen, 129, 130
Schiffer, Claudia, 173
Schindler, Friedemann, 219, 220, 262n13
Schleifer, Carl Hermann, 256n10
Schleswig-Holstein-Musikfestival, 137, 138,
256n12; political representation at, 143
Scholz & Friends, 84, 85
Schow, Jürgen, 259n15
Schreiber, Alfred, 75, 78, 98; on American
Express, 30–31; on corporate philanthropy,
28; on partnerships, 30, 77, 159
Schröder, Gerhard, 20, 58, 189
Schulze, Gerhard, 7, 23, 67, 68, 102, 147–48,
159, 181; on cultural politics, 175, 177,
195, 196; on cultural production, 62, 151;
de-differentiation and, 248n3; Erlebnis
and, 31, 37, 109, 135–36; on events,
136; on postindustrial societies, 135; on
subcultures/media, 150
Schütz, Claus: Wrapped Reichstag and, 162
Schwarz, Hans-Peter, 262n14; on media,
218–19, 221; on museums/technologies,
210
Schwarzenegger, Arnold, 254n36
Schwarzkopf, H. Norman, 128, 254n39
Schygulla, Hanna, 7, 110, 131; Leibovitz
photograph of, 118, 119, 120–21, 125;
photo of 253n21
Scolof, Danny: on game culture, 154
Seagrams Building, 31
Sears, 80, 250n23
Seating: anthropology of, 204–10
Self-fulfillment, 112, 113
Self-image, 42; imaged self and, 123
Sensation, 14; coverage of, 244n11; success
for, 12, 13
Sensorama (movie), 226
Serra, Richard, 52, 179, 182; on self-
promotion, 35
Shakespeare, William, 53
Shanghai Bank, 31
Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Real Estate Hold-
ings, a Real-Time Social System, as of May 1,
1971, 15–16
Shell: auto racing and, 250n38; German
reaction to, 245n3
Sherk, Bonnie, 168
Sherman, Cindy, 99
Showgirls, 130–31
“Showgirls,” a “Portfolio by Annie Leibovitz,”
129, 130, 255n47
Siemens Nixdorf Austria, 216, 261n8
Silicon Graphics, 216, 261n8
Silverstone, Roger, 207, 212; on museums,
201, 210, 211; on myth making/
exhibitions, 204
SiN. See Sarajevo Is Next
Sinatra, Frank, 31, 66–67, 248n10
Situationists: Wrapped Reichstag and, 134
Sky-Media Loft, 215, 262n8
SMF. See Sarajevo Music Forum
Smith, Roberta, 15, 244n20
Smithson, Robert, 52
Smithsonian Institution, 28, 100; sponsor-
ship policy of, 24–25
Snake (Serra), 182
Snowden, Lord, 102
Social agendas, 5, 238
Social capital, 8–12

Social Darwinism, 216
Social differentiation, 32
Social interaction, 38, 232
Social issues, 85, 132, 136, 157, 161; dis-
course on, 79, 83; representations of, 126;
technology and, 200
Social legitimacy, 5, 70
Social policies, 35, 82, 88; cultural policies
and, 62; management policy and, 42;
shaping, 25
Social programs, 97, 160, 238, 239; analysis
of, 63; legitimization of, 244n9
Social relations, 83; corporations and, 236,
240
Social welfare, 82
Society: globalization of, 21; participation in,
238
Society for Old and New Media, 228
Solomon-Godeau, Abigail, 122
Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation
(SRGF), 10, 177, 208; cultural politics
of, 184; DGB and, 186; GMB and, 180,
181, 184
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, 14, 20,
57, 194, 201, 223; Art of the Motorcycle
and, 18, 112, 248n8; board of, 16; as cul-
tural marker, 185, 186; curatorial strate-
gies of, 208; expansion of, 210; Giorgio
Armani/Haacke and, 17; globalization of,
8, 177, 184, 187, 188; Hugo Boss Prize
at, 188; image of, 209; promotional trans-
fer and, 188; sponsorship agreement and,
15; Virtual Museum project of, 262n16;
Web site for sponsors, 235; Wright and,
181, 184, 186
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum Board of
Trustees (Haacke), 15, 16
Sontag, Susan, 127, 254nn34, 36
Sony, 18, 36, 43, 158, 246nn8, 13
Sony Center, 8, 57
SOS Racisme, 80
Sozialsponsor, 86
Soziotopes, 50
Space, 213; communal, 168; cultural, 137,
265n47; individualized, 34; multiple-user,
228; museum, 201; private, 241; public,
16, 35, 37, 109, 162, 241; social, 38, 161,
240; urban, 35–36; virtual, 227, 230. See
also Corporate space
Index 295
Sponsors: image of, 141–44; museums and,
13, 214; nonprofit, 135; objectives of,
135; promotions by, 223
Sponsorships, 3, 5, 11–12, 26–29, 38, 41, 48,
125, 148, 197; budgets for, 264–65n46;
conditions of, 90, 231; contractual, 6;
corporate, 22, 30, 73, 90, 92, 134, 163,
175, 187; cultural, 7, 24, 25, 27–30, 32,
61, 63, 78, 82, 89, 91, 94, 102, 106, 134,
135, 160, 192, 213, 234, 246n8, 265n46;
cultural politics and, 10, 99, 143; cultural
production and, 140; cultural tourism
and, 108–10; cyber, 8; diversity, 89–90;
end of, 234, 236–41; environmental, 29;
ethnic/national identities and, 86; event,
28; expansion of, 29, 62, 234; images
and, 31, 73; jazz, 77; legitimation/institu-
tionalization of, 25, 233; multicultural,
89–90; objective of, 39–40, 41, 135, 239;
private, 175; product, 31, 213; public re-
lations and, 39; regional, 142–43; social,
3, 7, 27, 29, 78–80, 82, 86, 89, 160, 234;
social legitimacy of, 75; sports, 3, 27, 29
Sports Illustrated, 130
Spur, Gunter, 199
SRGF. See Solomon R. Guggenheim
Foundation
Stage: image of, 141
Stallone, Sylvester, 127, 128, 254n35
Starlight Express (Webber), 144
Stella, Frank: BMW painting by, 43
Stemmle, Dieter: on advertisement, 85
Stern, 258n53
Stern, Isaac, 129, 254n39
Stern, Robert A. M., 246n12
Stich, Michael, 7, 118; Leibovitz photograph
of, 110, 111, 112–13
Stieglitz, Alfred, 122
Stiftungsinitiative der deutschen Wirtschaft,
17
Still, Clyfford, 179
Sting, 158
Stocker, Gerfried: on documentation/
collection, 225
Strachwitz, Rupert Graf: on funding, 14
Strategies: corporate, 24, 196, 216; post-
modern, 100, 125, 128
Straw, Will, 257n26
Strawberry Fields, 254n31
296 Index
Streets on Fire (movie), 160
Stüger, Alexander: on Infowar, 216
Subculture, 75, 148, 160, 240; media and,
150; mega-events and, 159; social causes
and, 161; subversive element of, 147;
trends in, 150; youth culture and, 146.
See also Youth subculture
Süddeutsche Zeitung, 83, 107; American
Express advertisement in, 256n16; on
museums/sponsors, 13
Sunset Boulevard (Webber), 144
Surreal Field, 154–55
Sussmuth, Rita, 258n53
Sutherland, Ivan, 226
Swank, Hilary, 264n31
Swimmer in the Econo-mist, The (Rosenquist),
187
Swimming Dancers (Leibovitz), 254n33
Symbolic exchanges, 18, 72
Tate Modern: visitors to, 209
Taylor, Elizabeth, 112
TBWA advertising agency, 71, 72, 249n18
Technical Museum, 139
Technology, 18, 134, 171, 213, 216, 244n10;
access to, 263n21; art and, 218, 221;
communications, 226, 232; consumption
and, 155; corporations and, 139; culture
and, 40–41, 197, 220–21, 225, 261n6;
democracy and, 233; interactivity and,
155; media, 168, 219, 221, 224, 261n6;
museums and, 210; promoting, 232;
social problems and, 200; transfer, 139,
140, 231; transportation, 109; virtual
space and, 230; visualization, 213; youth
culture and, 155
“Technology Conquers Our Lives,” 202
Techno scene, 146, 147, 148, 150, 151
Techno Tourism, 148
Telecommunications Act (1996), 233
Telefunken Systemtechnik, 40
Telemundo, 90
Terry, Jennifer, 230, 263n27
Texaco-Metropolitan Opera International
Radio Network, 135
Thatcher, Margaret, 158
Theatrum Anatomicum, 228, 230
Theory and Event, 255n6
Thomas Cook travel company, 109
Thornton, Sarah, 147, 150, 245n5
“3D-Video-Visualization,” 53
3 SAT, 107
Thurn und Taxis, Gloria von, 107
Tibetan Freedom Concerts, 258n45
Till, Wolfgang, 107
Times Square, 37
Time Warner, 15
Tinguely, Jean, 226
Tischgesellschaft (Fritsch), 173
Tobacco industry, 91–92
Toepler, Stefan, 11, 12
Together Again tour, 31
Top Gun (movie), 128
Tortorici, Anthony, 135
Toulouse-Lautrec, Henri, 248n7
Tourism, 201, 213; artistic creativity, 115;
cultural, 7, 108–10, 115, 117, 142, 176,
178, 256n16; defining, 109; German,
193; global, 110; postmodern, 176, 195;
promoting, 137; regional, 218; social
organization of, 109; visual character of,
138, 171
Transnational corporations, 43; cyberspace
and, 213, 232–33
Travel and Leisure: Rawsthorn in, 209
Travel Related Services (TRS), 103
Trump, Ivana and Donald, 124
Tschumi, Bernard, 133, 171, 255n2; on
insertion, 132; Woodstock/Wrapped
Reichstag and, 134
Turner, Sebastian: on Meffire advertisement,
85
Tutankhamen, 180
20th-Century Art: Masterpieces from the
Guggenheim Collection, 179
Twitchell, James: on Adcult, 248n1
Two-Way Mirror Cylinder inside Cube and
Video Salon: Rooftop Park for Dia Center
for the Arts (Graham), 34
Umbach, Klaus: on Fidelio wall, 143–44
Umbrellas, Japan-USA, 1984–91, The
(Christo), 167, 168
Unification, 58, 161, 163, 240
United Colors of Benetton, 250n22
United Nations Development Programme,
258n45
U.S. Defense Department: funding from, 226

United Stations, 160
Until the End of the World (movie): cultural
tourism and, 117
Urban, Ulrich: festival and, 256n10
Urbanization, 192, 208
Urchs, Ossi, 150; photo of, 149
URLs, 231
Urry, John, 37; on tourism, 7, 109, 143, 176
U2, 160
Values, 20, 32
Van der Rohe, Mies: Seagrams Building and,
31
V&S Vin & Spirit, 70, 72, 249n18
Vanity Fair, 100; Leibovitz in, 99, 103, 104,
122, 125–26, 127
Varnedoe, Kirk, 64, 66
VAT 69, 202
VDM. See Vitra Design Museum
Venice Biennale, 52, 56, 219
Venice Guggenheim Museum of Modern and
Contemporary Art, 177
Venturi, Robert, 37, 204
Vereine der Freunde der Nationalgalerie:
Sensation and, 13
Video Place (Krueger), 226
Viola, Bill, 219
Virginia Slims woman, 129
Virilio, Paul: on real environments, 37
Virtual reality (VR), 226–27
Visualization, 134, 171, 230
Vitali, Christoph, 172–73
Vitra Design Museum (VDM), 8, 197,
204–10, 239; exhibitions at, 206, 207;
photo of, 205
Vitra Foundation, 204
Voest Alpine MCE, 261n7
Volkswagen, 29, 44, 199, 246n8; contempo-
rary culture and, 192; counterculture and,
190; grant from, 191; Italian culture and,
193; KMW and, 189–96; museum con-
cept and, 191; National Socialism and,
190, 259n12; public relations by, 195;
Rolling Stones and, 48, 71, 144; sponsor-
ship by, 195; theme park by, 260n24;
Wolfsburg and, 190, 192
Volkswagen Art Foundation, 191, 192
Volkswagen Beetle, 156, 190, 192, 201, 202
Volkswagen Jetta, 190
Index 297
Volkswagen-Versicherungsdienst GmbH
(VVD), 191
Volunteers: raising, 158–59
Von Waldburg, Isabelle, 148; photo of, 149
Vostell, Wolf, 219
VR. See Virtual reality
VVD. See Volkswagen-Versicherungsdienst
GmbH
Wagner, Richard, 255n9
Waldheim, Kurt, 256n15
Walker Art Center: Beyond Interface at, 224
Walmart, Gifford and, 250n25
Warhol, Andy, 6, 70, 123, 173, 188, 192,
226, 249n16; Absolut Vodka and, 71; on
advertising/art, 70; BMW painting by,
43; photography and, 122
Waterman, Robert, 42
Waters, Malcolm, 18, 38, 80
Watson, Sophie: on postmodernist interven-
tion, 38
Watson, Thomas, 32
WDR, 107
We Are the World campaign, 159
Webber, Andrew Lloyd, 139, 144
Weber, Bruce, 102
WebTV, 222, 223
Wegerhoff, Susanne, 102–3, 248n10
Weiner, Marc, 255n9
Weissman, George: on corporate infra-
structure, 26
Wellmer, Albrecht, 167
Weltanschauung, 137, 156
Welt der Spiele (Schindler), 219
Wenders, Wim, 7, 107, 110; American
Express and, 105, 115, 117; Berlin Wall
and, 129; cultural colonization and,
253n26; Germany’s past and, 117;
Leibovitz photograph of, 113, 114, 115,
116, 117–18
Wenner, Jann, 104
Wernick, Andrew, 23; on advertising, 70; on
live performances, 249n11; on material/
symbolic economies, 68; on promotional
culture, 7, 70, 249n12
Weston, Edward, 122
Wever, Ulrich: on founders/inventors, 42
“What’s High, What’s Low—and Who
Cares?” (Kruger), 63, 69
298 Index
White Oak Dance Project, 126, 127
Whitney Museum of American Art, 10, 18,
75–76, 222, 246n9; Basquiat at, 89;
BMW cars at, 47; Intel and, 223; Philip
Morris and, 35
Willis, Susan, 37
Willnauer, Franz, 138, 256n12
Wilson, Robert, 244n20
Wine Growers Association of Lower Austria,
142–43
Wings of Desire, The (movie), 115, 117, 118
WLTV-TV, 89
Wolfsburg, 259n17; cultural politics in, 195;
cultural production in, 193; grant from,
191; Italian culture and, 193; KMW and,
193; urbanization in, 192, 193; Volks-
wagen and, 190, 192
Women (Leibovitz and Sontag), 130, 255n47
Woodstock, 7, 99, 132–33, 136, 154, 171;
as cultural commodity, 151, 155–56; as
promotional vehicle, 156; revisiting,
151–52; trademark of, 152; and Wrapped
Reichstag compared, 133–34
Woodstock (movie), 255n3, 257n33
Woodstock ’94, 99, 152; promoting, 151,
154–56; retro fashion of, 257n33
Woodstock ’94: The Guide, 152, 153
Woodstock ’94 Nation News, 154
Woodstock ’99, 151, 152, 156
“Woodstock Wars, The” (Epsen), 156
Workplaces, 50; art in, 49, 51, 97
World of Charles and Ray Eames, The, 206
World Party, 146
World Trade Organization (WTO), 20,
236
World Wide Web, 222, 223
Wrapped Reichstag: Berlin, 1971–95 (Christo
and Jeanne-Claude), 5, 7, 8, 22, 52, 98,
132–33, 161–62, 171, 190, 240; impact
of, 133, 163, 167, 168; photo of, 164, 165,
166; as political/cultural event, 163, 167;
sponsorships and 63; and Woodstock
compared, 133–34
Wright, Frank Lloyd, 182; Guggenheim
Museum and, 181, 184, 186, 201;
Johnson’s Wax Building and, 31; mod-
ernist architecture and, 184, 208–9
WTO. See World Trade Organization
Wyeth, Jamie, 123
Yeo, Eileen and Stephen, 246n5
Yiftachel, Oren, 246n11
Young British artists (YBAs), 12, 14
Youth culture, 144–52, 256n21; commodi-
fication of, 148; denunciation of, 147;
hierarchies of, 150; media culture and,
148; subcultures and, 146; technology
and, 155
Youth subculture, 8, 145, 147; codes of, 148;
media and, 147, 151
ZDF, 83, 107
Zehetbauer, Rolf: BMW and, 199
Zeithorizont, 199, 200, 201, 204, 208
Zeitmotor, 199
Zeitsignale, 199
Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie
(ZKM), 8, 214, 218, 220–21, 222; media
art and, 262n14; Schindler at, 219,
262n13
Zimmermann, Tom: data glove by, 226
Zvesdochotov, Konstantin, 150
Mark W. Rectanus is professor of German at Iowa State University. He has held ap-
pointments as a research fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation in
Munich, Germany, and as a visiting professor at Ohio State University. He is the
author of four books; his research focuses on the publishing industry and literary
marketplace, cultural politics, and museums.